On 24 September IAEA passed a resolution calling on Tehran to stop uranium conversion immediately and threatened to report it to the UN Security Council, which could consequently impose sanctions on Iran. The resolution was adopted by vote rather than, as usual, by consensus.
"The resolution does not have a legal or technical background, but it is a political resolution," Ambassador Shamsian said at a press conference held under the title "Iran's peaceful programme for nuclear energy".
Some Western countries accuse Iran of trying to develop illicit weapons under the guise of a programme for the development of nuclear energy for civilian purposes. Iran strongly rejects the accusation, invoking its inalienable right to uranium enrichment for electricity production purposes.
Shamsian said that Iran "does not accept double standards," citing the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons which guarantees all countries the right to use atomic energy for peaceful purposes. Iran acceded to the treaty in 1974.
"Islam does not allow the use of nuclear weapons, and Tehran's official position is that the world should be rid of atomic weapons," the ambassador said, warning that no pressure was put on such countries as India, Pakistan and Israel, which had admitted possessing nuclear weapons.
The Iranian Embassy made available to the media copies of a document on civilian nuclear activities in Iran since 1968 when the US company AMF started building a nuclear reactor there. The document says that after the victory of the Islamic revolution in 1979 Iran did not withdraw from the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and that in the 1980s Iran invited IAEA inspectors to visit its nuclear installations.