Iran rejects fuel swap offer  

Iran rejects key parts of a draft uranium exchange deal that has been agreed upon during talks in Geneva in September 2009, diplomats in Vienna said on Tuesday (19 Jan). According to the deal Iran was supposed to send abroad 75 percent of its low-enriched uranium (LEU), designed to ease fears the material could be used to make nuclear weapons. [1]

In the meantime, U.S. intelligence agencies finalized a new assessment of Tehran's nuclear program that sees Iran pushing forward with nuclear weapons research but not yet launching its bomb program in full, U.S. officials said. [2]

Quick Timeline: Iran's non-compliance

Since the beginning of the nuclear row with the international community, Iran did not move away one straw from its original position.

• In July 2006, the IAEA adopted Resolution 1696, which demands that Iran suspends its uranium enrichment. [3] The resolution offered Iran one month (from July 31 to August 31, 2006) to stop its uranium enrichment program and all other "research and development" activities or face the threat of sanctions. [4] Iran, however, failed to respond in a satisfactory way to this resolution.[5]
  
  
• Iran's failure to comply with the IAEA's demands of the previous resolution, the UN Security Council in December 2006 issued Resolution 1737. [6] The resolution placed economic sanctions on Iran and prohibited UN member states from supplying Iran with materials or technology that might be used for Iran's nuclear weapons development program. [7]
  
  
• In March 2007 the UN Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1747. [8] Iran reacted with defiance, government spokesman Gholam Hossein Elham said: "We don't welcome (UN) to adopt another resolution, but there's no need to worry. [...] Suspension is completely impossible and cannot be brought up, they have already given up this; in this respect, sanction is not new and will have no effect on people's progress." [9]
  
  
• In March 2008 the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 1803 due to Iran's refusal to suspend uranium enrichment and heavy-water-related projects. [10]
  
  
• In November 2009 the IAEA's Board of Governors issued a resolution against Iran calling for it to cease enriching uranium. On December 2 the Islamic Republic defiantly rejected the resolution. The resolution is the first against Tehran in almost four years. [11] The resolution contains a strong call on Tehran to implement the relevant UN Security Council resolutions, as well as providing the international community with necessary transparency needed to prove the exclusively peaceful nature of Iran's nuclear program. [12]

The UN Security Council has repeatedly demanded that Iran halts its uranium enrichment program. Continuing and accelerating the process toward a more concentrated form of uranium would reveal that Iran was "positioning itself for the production of nuclear arms." [13]

Iran's nuclear ambitions

On November 29, 2009, Iran declared plans to build 10 uranium enrichment facilities. The West has repeatedly signaled it is running out of patience with Iran's continuing nuclear ambitions. British Foreign Secretary David Miliband labeled Iran's announcement as a provocation: "This epitomizes the fundamental problem that we face with Iran," he said. [14] He added: "[...] Instead of engaging with us Iran chooses to provoke and dissemble." [15]

While Western diplomats are under fear, China would block new measures against Tehran, [16] German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Monday, even if there is no U.N. agreement to act against Tehran, Iran faces further sanctions unless it changes stance in talks over its nuclear program. [17]