Brazil Demands Iran Guarantee On Nuclear Program

Iran's Foreign Minister Manuchehr Mottaki (right) listens to his Brazilian counterpart Celso Amorim as he addresses a joint news conference in Tehran.

The foreign minister of Brazil, a nonpermanent member of the UN Security Council, has demanded that Iran guarantee its nuclear program has no military aims.

Celso Amorim made the call after meeting his Iranian counterpart, Manuchehr Mottaki, in Tehran, as world powers push for a new set of UN sanctions over Iran's nuclear program.

Amorim said that Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva "has said this: what Brazil wants for Iran is what it wants for Brazil and what it is allowed by the [Nuclear] Nonproliferation Treaty.

"That means: having the capacity to have a nuclear program for peaceful use and, at the same time, to give the international community guarantees and assurances that there is no diversion of this program for military purposes."

Amorim also urged Tehran and world powers to show "flexibility" over a nuclear-fuel deal stalled for several months.

The deal envisages supplying nuclear fuel for a Tehran research reactor in exchange for the Islamic republic's low-enriched uranium.

Amorim indicated that states such as Brazil and Turkey could be "political guarantors" to resolve the crisis.

Brazil's president is scheduled to visit Tehran in May.

compiled from agency reports