Ahmadinejad: Iran to propose 3rd-party uranium enrichment

Iran will propose that it is prepared to buy from a third party uranium enriched to the grade it requires for its Tehran reactor rather than carry out the enrichment itself, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Wednesday.

His remarks, ahead of Thursday talks in Geneva with six major world powers about Iran's nuclear program, represent the first time Tehran has agreed to discuss specifics of its enrichment operations with the powers.

"One of the subjects on the agenda of this negotiation is how we can get fuel for our Tehran reactor," the president was quoted by ISNA news agency as saying.

"As I said in New York, we need 19.75%-enriched uranium. We said that, and we propose to buy it from anybody who is ready to sell it to us. We are ready to give 3.5%-enriched uranium and then they can enrich it more and deliver to us 19.75%-enriched uranium."

In New York last week, Ahmadinejad said Iran would seek to enrich uranium to 20% itself if it could not find the product in the market for its research reactor in Tehran.

The five megawatt plant was supplied by the United States before the 1979 Islamic revolution that toppled the US-backed shah. The reactor is under IAEA supervision.

In remarks to journalists on Wednesday, Ahmadinejad lashed out at criticisms over Iran's disclosure last week of a new enrichment plant and said his country would not be "harmed" by the outcome of the talks.

"The negotiators can definitely adopt any policy that they want, but we will not be harmed," the Fars new agency quoted the president as saying.

"Iran has prepared itself for any condition and our nation has learnt over the past 30 years to stand on its feet and change any circumstance to its benefit."

He also made the announcement about the enrichment proposal but the details were not immediately clear.

Uranium enrichment is the sensitive process that lies at the centre of Western concerns over Iran's real ambitions. The process can produce the fuel for nuclear power or, in highly extended form, the fissile core of an atomic bomb.

Iran's current program permits enrichment to reach 5% A full 90% would be required to produce a bomb.

US: Cooperation or isolation

Earlier, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that Iran must meet its international obligations over its suspect nuclear program or face "greater isolation."

"Iran has a choice: to comply with its international obligations and that would mean not only offering inspections (of its nuclear facilities) but ending its activities absent the kind of monitoring and supervision that would guarantee that what they are doing is solely for peaceful purposes," she told reporters.

"The alternative track," she added, was "greater isolation and international pressure."

Clinton said she would not prejudge the outcome of crunch talks in Geneva Thursday between top Iranian nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili and senior officials from Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States.

She spoke after chairing a UN Security Council meeting on sexual violence against women in armed conflict.

The 15-member Council has imposed three sets of sanctions against Iran over its refusal to freeze its uranium enrichment activities which the West and Israel sees as a cover to acquire nuclear weapons.

The United States and its allies also want Iran to provide UN inspectors immediate access to a newly disclosed second uranium enrichment plant, which has raised suspicions about the true nature of its nuclear program.

The head of the UN nuclear watchdog, Mohamed ElBaradei, said that Iran was "on the wrong side of the law" by not declaring its new enrichment plant before last week.

Jalili meanwhile said Wednesday that he was heading for the talks with a "positive approach" while atomic energy chief Ali Akbar Salehi said Iran was ready to discuss concerns about its new enrichment plant.