US, EU Agree to Resolution on Iran

The United States and the EU have agreed on a draft resolution calling on Iran to give up its nuclear weapons program or suffer the consequences, according to information obtained on Thursday from diplomats close to the negotiations.

By agreeing to a much tougher resolution containing a time limit, something the US has been pushing for, the EU's "big three", France, Britain and Germany, are adapting the United States' hard line with Iran and abandoning their own policy of "constructive engagement".

Time limit, but no "trigger mechanism"

The draft demands Iran freeze all uranium enrichment activities and expresses serious concern that it has not heeded previous calls to do so. The resolution also expresses alarm at Iranian plans to process more than 40 tons of raw uranium into uranium hexafluoride, the feed stock for enrichment.

Most importantly, it calls on the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) director general, Mohamed ElBaradei, to submit a report on November 25 reviewing the past two years of investigations, effectively setting the stage for a November showdown.

However, the draft does not contain so-called trigger mechanisms, which would see the matter referred to the United Nations Security Council, the international body empowered to impose sanctions, should the stubborn aspiring nuclear power fail to comply. But it does keep open the option of "further steps".

Though the Europeans agreed to much tougher wording, the draft is still a compromise. "It's a text all six countries can live with," a diplomat close to the negotiations, which are still ongoing in Vienna, told the Reuters news agency.

Iran remains defiant

This week , new evidence surfaced substantiating US claims that Iran is in the process of building nuclear weapons. A US nuclear monitor published satellite images of an Iranian weapons facility, the Parchin military complex southeast of Tehran, which it said was being used for research and testing.

Iranian officials denied the charge and insisted that their country's nuclear ambitions were entirely peaceful. Earlier this week, a defiant Iranian official told reporters Iran would resume uranium enrichment despite a promise made to European diplomats last October to suspend such activities.

The new draft still has to be approved by the IAEA's 35-nation board of governors.