Weighing compromise on Iran's nukes

Iranian officials say the diagram was unsolicited, and part of a black-market offer made by the nuclear network of Pakistani A. Q. Khan to Iran in 1987. Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi dismissed as "a sheer lie" speculation that the design proves Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons.

"Was this a teaser? We don't know," says the Western diplomat. "The fact remains, we have to check out the information."

One source familiar with the document says it is of an "old-fashioned" Chinese design, consistent with blueprints sold to Libya by the A. Q. Khan network in the 1980s. The IAEA report notes it deals with "the casting and machining of enriched, natural and depleted uranium metal into hemispherical forms."

The Western source says it is "not a core of a weapon," as has been described in some media reports, but an element used to increase the yield of a nuclear blast by slowing down the process. There are no dimensions, he says, but it would be large.

"It's obviously not innocuous - any design for a weapon is heavy stuff," says the source, who asked not to be further identified. "But in the big picture, it's not the scary suitcase bomb.... This thing wouldn't fit in a missile, not even in a truck. They would need the Enola Gay [the US plane which dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in 1945], and they don't have that."

Still, many questions remain. Mr. ElBaradei's report repeats the call to suspend enrichment-related activities, and notes "no new developments with regard to questions and access" at a site at Lavisan-Shian, which was bulldozed last year, and where a layer of topsoil was removed.

Iran has signed but not ratified the Additional Protocol of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which allows for snap inspections of any suspect site.

The IAEA report came days after details emerged in The New York Times of US briefings for ElBaradei and senior delegates last July. They were based on a computer acquired by US intelligence from a "long time" source in Iran who has since died, the Times reported, and are alleged to show missile-cone designs consistent with a nuclear payload. Saying they must protect the source, US officials have so far refused to specify the provenance of the data, or to show the original data to the IAEA.

European Union foreign-policy chief Javier Solana said the vote in Iran's parliament was "not good news." French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy - whose nation, with Britain and Germany, was in talks with Iran until August - said "negative signals" were coming from Tehran.

But Security Council action is unlikely, as Russia and China oppose such a move. "We do not see such a threat [of Iran acquiring nuclear weapons] at the moment," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Monday. "Under the current situation, while Iran is not working on enriching uranium, we should continue operating within the IAEA."

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