UNITED NATIONS, April 24: The UN Security Council will consider a draft resolution that would legally require Iran to comply with demands that it freeze all uranium enrichment activities, US Ambassador John Bolton said on Monday.
Mr Bolton told reporters the 15-member council would be discussing this week possible responses to a report by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) head Mohamed ElBaradei.
The report assesses Tehran’s compliance with UN demands to stop enrichment activities among other things by a Friday deadline set by the council on March 29 in a non-binding statement.
“Our expectation would be that assuming no change of direction by Iran and there’s no reason to think there will be a change of direction, we’ll look at a ‘Chapter 7’ resolution to make mandatory all the existing IAEA resolutions,” Mr Bolton said.
Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, which is invoked in case of threats to international peace and security, can open the door to sanctions or even military action.
“We will be consulting this week on the nature of the language (of the draft),” Mr Bolton said.
Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs, Nicholas Burns, said on Friday that Britain and France were expected to present the Chapter 7 draft next week.
But China’s UN envoy Wang Guangya, the president of the council for this month, warned on Monday: “I don’t think it (a Chapter 7 resolution) will be a productive move.”
Commenting on Iran’s assertions that sanctions were unlikely because of opposition from Russia and China, Mr Bolton said: “I don’t know what the Security Council is going to do.
“I said repeatedly I think this is a test for the Security Council and we’re going to take it step-by-step. The first step will be a Chapter 7 resolution.”
But some diplomats said there was no certainty that the Council would hold a formal meeting on the issue this week.
US officials have said the political directors of the council’s five permanent members were likely to meet in Paris some time next week—AFP
