U.S. Dismisses "Media Event" in Iran, Urges Compliance With IAEA

Kuwait News Agency:

Dismissing a "staged media event" by Iranian President Mohammed Khatami, State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli on Wednesday called on Iranian officials to grant International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) requests for access to facilities and officials associated with Iranian nuclear activities.

Khatami, who led journalists on a tour of the Iranian underground nuclear facility at Natanz, said Iran would not give up its uranium enrichment efforts.

If Iran were serious about demonstrating transparency in its nuclear program, it should answer all outstanding IAEA questions, Ereli said.

"If Iran were really serious about allaying the concerns of the international community, they would stop denying IAEA full and unrestricted access to suspicious sites like the Parchin high-explosives facility, they would stop refusing IAEA requests to interview key officials associated with Iran's nuclear activities, they would tell the truth about the history of their advanced P-2 centrifuge program, they would tell the truth about their Lavizan facility before they bulldozed it to the ground, they would answer openly questions about past plutonium separation experiments," Ereli said.

If Iran was committed to transparency in its nuclear program, there are "real, effective, meaningful ways to demonstrate that commitment beyond a staged media event like is being reported," Ereli said.