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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran | |
| Iran has shares in French nuclear facility | |
| 2007-04-09 | |
WESTERN GOVERNMENTS have been accused of "stunning hypocrisy" after it was revealed that Iran has a 10% stake in the world's largest uranium enrichment plant in France.
Because of its involvement, Iran has also been learning more about the latest enrichment technology. It claims that it only wants to enrich uranium to improve its performance as a fuel in nuclear power stations, but Western nations are worried that it will be used to make nuclear bombs. Iran's stake in Eurodif has been exposed in a report written by a French nuclear expert for the Greens and the European Free Alliance in the European parliament. Documents confirming the connection have also been seen by the Sunday Herald. They show that in 2006, Reza Aghazadeh, Iran's vice-president and the president of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organisation, was replacing the Iranian representatives on the board of Sofidif, a joint French-Iranian company with a major stake in Eurodif. According to a meeting of Sofidif in June 2006, the purpose of the company was "to participate in the study, the realisation and the operation of uranium enrichment plants based on the French gaseous diffusion technique". Other papers show that in 2005 Sofidif's investment in Eurodif yielded £12 million in dividends. Eurodif, formed by France, Belgium and Spain in the 1970s and run by French nuclear company Cogema, enriches uranium for 100 reactors in France and worldwide. At the same time, Iran has been accused of breaching its obligations under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty by enriching uranium at a plant at Natanz in central Iran. Last week, the United Nations discussed moves to toughen sanctions against the country in an attempt to force it to shut the plant. Mycle Schneider, the Paris-based nuclear consultant who wrote the report for the MEPs, was shocked by what he discovered. "The continuous deep involvement of Iran in the world's largest multinational uranium enrichment plant in France is the perfect illustration of the stunning level of hypocrisy that has governed the non-proliferation treaty," he said. The point was reinforced by Dr David Lowry, a nuclear proliferation specialist based in Surrey. "The hypocrisy of France, as a nuclear technology supplier to Iran, ganging up on its customer client with the other self-appointed permanent bully-boy' members of the UN Security Council would be funny if it wasn't so serious," he said. Rebecca Harms, vice-president of the Green group in the European parliament, said: "It's time to stop pretending that there is a fundamental difference between the peaceful atom and nuclear weapons. It is not only operating uranium enrichment facilities that provide the basis for a nuclear weapons programme, it is nuclear technology and know-how that paves the way to the bomb." | |
| Posted by:Steve |
| #8 And the Brits expected the EU to help out last week? Sheesh |
| Posted by: Captain America 2007-04-09 20:50 |
| #7 I remain ambivalent on the general population for their complacence in light of the creeping Islamization, car-b-ques, et al, but they don't deserve that slam....yet Nominally, they have the ability to elect a new government. |
| Posted by: Rob Crawford 2007-04-09 20:09 |
| #6 Quel surprise! Who would have thought it. |
| Posted by: Whiskey Mike 2007-04-09 19:56 |
| #5 This is nothing new. The French allied with the Ottomans allowing them to attack on Vienna in 1683. I'm proud they are our oldest enemy. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2007-04-09 19:49 |
| #4 I'll backtrap that ham-handed slam. The French elitists, corporations, and politicians are whores. I remain ambivalent on the general population for their complacence in light of the creeping Islamization, car-b-ques, et al, but they don't deserve that slam....yet |
| Posted by: Frank G 2007-04-09 18:40 |
| #3 Because of its involvement, Iran has also been learning more about the latest enrichment technology....According to a meeting of Sofidif in June 2006, the purpose of the company was "to participate in the study, the realisation and the operation of uranium enrichment plants based on the French gaseous diffusion technique". OK, you French whores (JFM and A3089 excepted, of course) - does a terrorist states' share ownership in a company usually involve transfer of sensitive technology? Or is this just standard practice with your Islamic overlords. Keeeee-rist! |
| Posted by: Frank G 2007-04-09 18:33 |
| #2 Why is it 'Western governments' accused of hypocrisy and not just the French? Would the lede writer in WWII accuse all of the allies arrayed against the Nazis of hypocrisy because of the Vichy government's collaboration with Hitler? |
| Posted by: WTF 2007-04-09 18:06 |
| #1 Bomb them too... |
| Posted by: Master of Obvious 2007-04-09 17:56 |