Ali Asghar | SilverScorpio.Com

UPDATE 1-Iran defiant after U.N. sanctions vote

June 10, 2010 By vani Leave a Comment

June 9 (Reuters) – Iran voiced defiance after the U.N. Security Council imposed new sanctions on Wednesday, saying it would not halt uranium enrichment and suggesting it may reduce cooperation with the U.N. nuclear agency.

“Nothing will change. The Islamic Republic of Iran will continue uranium enrichment activities,” Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran’s envoy to the U.N. nuclear watchdog in Vienna, told reporters shortly after the U.N. vote in New York.

In Tehran, a senior lawmaker said Iranian MPs would review the level of the Islamic Republic’s cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

“The parliament will review Iran’s cooperation level with the agency as an extra-urgent matter,” Alaeddin Boroujerdi was quoted as saying by the official IRNA news agency.

Iran’s parliament has the power to oblige the government to change its cooperation with the IAEA, as it did in 2006 after the Vienna-based agency voted to report Iran to the U.N. Security Council.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman said the U.N. sanctions resolution was a “wrong” measure, Iran’s Arabic language al-Alam television reported.

“The resolution was a wrong move … it was not a constructive step … to resolve the nuclear issue. It will make the situation more complicated,” Ramin Mehmanparast said. (Reporting by Parisa Hafezi in Tehran and by Sylvia Westall and Fredrik Dahl in Vienna; editing by Myra MacDonald)

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Iran’s IAEA envoy says not handed over fuel swap letter

May 24, 2010 By vani Leave a Comment

Iran’s representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said on Sunday Iran had not yet delivered a letter to the agency outlining its nuclear fuel swap deal agreed last week with Brazil and Turkey.

“We have not handed in the letter,” Ali Asghar Soltanieh told Reuters. Iran’s IRNA news agency reported earlier on Sunday that Soltanieh had given the letter to the IAEA chief.

Iranian officials said the letter would be handed in on Monday.

(Reporting by Sylvia Westall)

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Keith Vaz wins in British polls

May 7, 2010 By vani Leave a Comment

London, May 7 (IANS) Indian-origin MP Keith Vaz held the Leicester East constituency for the Labour party in the British general election.

He defeated Conservative candidate Jane Hunt and Liberal Democrat candidate Ali Asghar.

Indian filmstar Sanjay Dutt had campaigned for Vaz in his constituency, that has a large population of South Asians, where he secured 53.8 percent of the vote. Vaz’s parents were from Goa and the family migrated to Britain from Yemen in 1965.

Keith has been a member of parliament for Leicester East since 1987. On July 26, 2007, Vaz was elected chairman of the influential Home Affairs Select Committee.

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Despite IAEA findings, Iran sings its old nuke-for-peaceful-purposes tune

September 19, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Tehran, Sep. 18 (ANI): Even as a secret IAEA report revealed that Iran is capable of making a nuclear bomb and is developing a missile system to carry an atomic warhead, Iranian officials have reiterated claims that the Islamic nation’s nuclear program is intended for peaceful purposes.

Fox News quoted Iran’s ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, as saying that Iran is sincere in wanting to negotiate with the West.

He added that Western countries should “read between the lines” about Iran’s intentions.

Although the prospects of finding anything between the lines were almost nil after the surfacing of the IAEA report, but Soltanieh insisted that discussions with the West would be a “real, new window of opportunity.”

The secret U.N. watchdog report, titled “Possible Military Dimension of Iran’s Nuclear Program,” concludes:

*Iran worked on developing a chamber inside a ballistic missile capable of housing a warhead payload “that is quite likely to be nuclear.”

*Iran engaged in “probable testing” of explosives commonly used to detonate a nuclear warhead – a method known as a “full-scale hemispherical explosively driven shock system.”

*Iran worked on developing a system “for initiating a hemispherical high explosive charge” of the kind used to help spark a nuclear blast.

“Iran has sufficient information to be able to design and produce a workable implosion nuclear device (an atomic bomb) based on HEU (highly enriched uranium) as the fission fuel,” The agency assessed.

On October 1, Iran is scheduled to meet with the U.S. and five other world powers seeking curbs on its atomic activities for the first time in more than a year.

However, Tehran says it is not prepared to discuss its nuclear activities. (ANI)

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Israel accuses IAEA of hiding critical information on Iran’s nuclear progress

August 30, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Jerusalem, Aug. 30 (ANI): Israel has accused the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of “hiding critical information on Iran’s nuclear progress” despite criticizing the country in its report for defying United Nations Security Council decisions.

“This is a harsh report, but it does not reflect all the information possessed by the IAEA on Iranian efforts to advance its military program, on its continuing efforts to hide and deceive, and on [Iran's] noncooperation with the IAEA and the demands of the international community,” The Jerusalem Post quoted Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor, as saying.

In the report, IAEA officials had said that Iran was stonewalling the agency about “possible military dimensions” to its program. IAEA said it had pressed Iran to clarify its uranium enrichment activities and reassure the world that it’s not trying to build an atomic weapon.

While Israeli officials would not give details about the information the IAEA was allegedly hiding, “we’re talking about information that would be far more incriminating for Iran,” a senior Israeli official said.

“The 35 member states of the IAEA can’t let [the organization] get away with hiding critical information on the dangers of the Iranian program,” the official added.

Meanwhile, the Iranian government reacted positively to the report’s publication.

The report confirmed “that Iran’s nuclear activities are peaceful,” Iran’s envoy to the IAEA Ali Asghar Soltanieh said on Saturday.

“It shows Iran has continued its cooperation with the agency … but at the same time will not accept any political pressure to take measures beyond its legal commitments,” he added.

But the Vienna-based agency bluntly stated: “Iran has not suspended its enrichment-related activities.

“There remain a number of outstanding issues which give rise to concerns and which need to be clarified to exclude the existence of possible military dimensions to Iran’s nuclear program,” according to the report. (ANI)

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Iran hangs three for 2008 mosque bombing

April 10, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Tehran – Iran Friday hanged three people convicted of being involved in a bomb explosion in a mosque in the southern city of Shiraz in 2008, Iranian media reported. Mohsen Eslamian, Ali-Asghar Pashtar and Rouzbeh Yahyazadeh – all members of Tondar, a previously unknown terror group – had been arrested last year and convicted by a revolutionary court, state-run IRIB television reported.

Fourteen people were killed and about 200 injured in a bomb explosion during a speech by a local cleric in a Shiraz mosque in April last year.

An appeals court upheld the verdict by Tehran’s revolutionary court which found all three guilty and convicted them to death, the station reported on its website.

Under Iran’s sharia law armed robbery, murder, adultery, drug smuggling and involvement in “terrorist acts” are punishable by death.

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Abductors ready to trade UN official for missing Quetta tailor

March 15, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Quetta (Pakistan), Mar.15 (ANI): A mysterious insurgent group has said that it is ready to trade John Solecki, the American chief of the U.N. refugee office for the 1,100 people who have gone missing since 2000.

They have said that they are a ready to exchange Solecki for missing Pakistani tailor Ali Asghar Bangulzai and others.

In Baluchistan, Solecki’s kidnapping appears to reflect growing nationalist sentiment among ethnic Baluch tribes, for whom the connection to militant Islam remains murky.

Bangulzai was picked up on October 18, 2001, from his shop on Quetta’s Saryab Road, a bustling commercial street where walls of graffiti display slogans such as “Death to Pakistan,” and “Free Baluchistan.”

Bangulzai’s son, Ghulam Farooq, suspects military intelligence is involved because his father was picked up once before, in the spring of 2000.

“When he came back, he told us he was held by [military intelligence] in a torture cell in Quetta city, where he wouldn’t be allowed to sleep and was repeatedly asked about his involvement with nationalist parties,” Farooq said.

When The Washington Times contacted the deputy inspector general of the police department in Quetta, he refused to discuss Solecki’s disappearance or other missing people, saying it was a very sensitive time.

Besides Mr. Bangulzai, the list of those said to have “disappeared” by the Baluch Liberation United Front includes laborers reportedly picked up from Chaman – a border town between Quetta and Kandahar in southern Afghanistan – government workers, students, tribal elders and political workers affiliated with the Baluch Republican Party. (ANI)

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