Brazil's refusal to allow the U.N. atomic agency to fully inspect one of its nuclear facilities has led to frustration within the organization, even though its officials do not believe the country is hiding a weapons program, diplomats said Monday.
| Of course not, why would the IAEA start looking for a weapons program now? |
The diplomats, who are familiar with the International Atomic Energy Agency's work, suggested the Vienna-based U.N. nuclear watchdog is more annoyed than worried about Brazil's decision to deny access earlier this year to uranium enrichment centrifuges at a facility being built near Rio de Janeiro. "It's not a question of suspecting that Brazil has a covert nuclear weapons program," said one of the diplomats, who all spoke on condition of anonymity. "It's more a question of principle." Although Brazil signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty in 1997 and said its nuclear program has purely peaceful objectives, questions about its commitment have simmered for more than a year. The government earlier this month confirmed that IAEA inspectors were denied access in February and March to centrifuges at the facility, in the town of Resende. It cited the need to protect industrial secrets and said the centrifuges were, and will remain, off-limits for visual inspection. The diplomat in Vienna, however rejected that argument. "The agency monitors some 900 facilities around the world with a myriad of technologies and has a good record of protecting those trade secrets," he said.
| "Look how well we protected Iraq, Iran and North Koreas secrets." |
Another diplomat said Brazil's argument could set a worrying precedent at a time the agency is fighting to gain full access to Iran's nuclear secrets to test Tehran's assertions that it was not pursuing a weapons program.
| Say, where does Brazil get it's oil, anyway? |
Iran became a focus of world concern after last year's discovery that it was assembling thousands of centrifuges for uranium enrichment, which has uses ranging from generating power to making nuclear weapons. Iran denies any weapons ambitions, saying it only wants to produce electricity. "Brazil's reticence could lead other countries to follow suit," and make the agency's job of policing nuclear programs more complicated, said the diplomat.
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