Iran: report on Iran's uranium smuggling fabrication

Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi today rejected a news report "released by Reuters on Iran's smuggling of uranium to other countries," the official news agency IRNA reported.

IRNA said "The Reuters news agency on Tuesday reported the UN nuclear watchdog is making an inventory of processed uranium in Iran amid concerns that inconsistencies in the tally could mean Tehran secretly shifted some uranium out of a nuclear facility, diplomats said. One intelligence agency has accused Iran of spiriting an unspecified quantity of processed uranium, which could be processed further and enriched for weapons purposes, out of the Isfahan uranium conversion facility to an unknown location."

Asefi said such a claim is not true. "Our nuclear activities are transparent and under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) ... Iran seeks nuclear technology for peaceful purposes. It will be meaningless for Iran to smuggle and enrich uranium in other states .. Western media had released such news in the past but their baseless claims were proved later, he said," IRNA reported.