United Nations inspectors have found new traces of highly enriched uranium in Iran, in equipment at a technical university in Tehran, the UN nuclear watchdog said on Thursday in a confidential report obtained by Agence France-Presse. Uranium can be enriched to produce nuclear-reactor fuel. But if it is enriched to a much greater degree it can be used to manufacture atom bombs.
Six world powers converged on Vienna on Thursday to break a deadlock on Iran’s nuclear programme after the United States made a dramatic offer to join talks with Tehran if it suspends uranium enrichment. Diplomats are hopeful that a compromise can be reached over Washington’s demand for Tehran to first suspend uranium enrichment.
The United States is ready for the first time to join talks with Iran over its nuclear programme, provided Russia and China agree to sanctions if Tehran refuses to limit its atomic ambitions, diplomats said on Wednesday. A Western diplomat said the US was "willing to sit at the table with the Iranians", together with the four other permanent United Nations Security Council members.
Iran’s top nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani promised that Tehran would cooperate with United Nations inspectors, in a meeting late on Thursday in Vienna with UN atomic agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei. ”The discussion was that of course Iran is continuing its cooperation with the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency],” Iran’s ambassador to the IAEA, Ali Asghar Soltanieh said.
The European Union is considering helping Iran to acquire a light-water nuclear reactor, but Tehran would have to give up enriching uranium on its soil as part of guarantees that it will not make atomic weapons, diplomats told Agence France-Presse on Tuesday. Under the deal being readied by European powers, Russia would enrich uranium on Iran’s behalf.
European Union leaders bluntly criticised Bolivia and Venezuela’s protectionist energy policies at summit talks of 58 European and Latin American leaders on Friday. Summit host Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel reminded the two countries that open markets were key to promoting economic growth and prosperity — a key issue at the meeting.
United Nations nuclear inspectors have found traces of highly enriched uranium at a site where Iran has denied such sensitive atomic work, diplomats told Agence France-Presse on Friday. The diplomats said the particles of weapon-grade uranium came from sample swipes inspectors from the Vienna-based UN nuclear watchdog made last January.
The United Nations nuclear watchdog said on Tuesday that it had adequate monitoring measures in place at a site where Brazil says it is now enriching uranium. ”There are safeguard measures that have been agreed that will meet the agency’s requirements,” said Marc Vidricaire, spokesperson for the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency.
Unrest in Africa. Mideast insurgency and terrorism. Iran’s nuclear brinkmanship. Russian pressure politics. South American resource nationalism. Piece by piece, the global energy puzzle reveals a bleak horizon for a world frantically searching for secure oil and gas supplies.
An Austrian advisory panel handling claims for paintings, sculptures and other items looted by the Nazis during World War II has recommended that 6 292 artworks be returned to their original owners, the minister of culture said on Wednesday.
Floods in Austria claimed their first victim on Tuesday as rising water in rivers caused a second dam to break, forcing many to evacuate their homes while emergency services worked to reinforce flood defences. An 18-month old boy was found dead on Tuesday afternoon after falling into the swollen Duerre Ager river while playing in front of his parents’ house.
Iran refuses to halt uranium enrichment, Iranian ambassador Aliasghar Soltanieh told Agence France-Presse on Thursday, the day after the United Nations Security Council called for the programme to be suspended. ”Iran’s decision on enrichment, particularly research and development, is irreversible.” said Soltanieh.
Sixty-five journalists were killed in 2005 — 13 less than the previous year — and freedom of the press was still under threat in many countries, according to the International Press Institute’s annual report. Iraq, where 23 journalists were killed last year, was still ”the most murderous country for journalists to report from”, the media watchdog said.
Viennese dog owners can now get a "driving licence for dogs" under a new initiative by city officials who thought man’s best-friend’s best friend could do with a bit of brushing up on canine conduct. Though voluntary, this new licence has both written and practical "driving" tests to assess the owner’s competence.
European Union defence chiefs are optimistic they will be able to find troops needed to respond to a United Nations request to back up its peacekeepers in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) as the African nation prepares for elections designed to end years of civil strife.
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/ 20 February 2006
Right-wing British historian David Irving pleaded guilty on Monday to criminal charges of denying the Holocaust and conceded in court he erred in contending there were no Nazi gas chambers at Auschwitz. ”I made a mistake when I said there were no gas chambers at Auschwitz,” Irving told the court as his trial opened in Vienna.
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/ 20 February 2006
Disgraced Austrian ski coach Walter Mayer faces criminal proceedings after a dramatic overnight car chase in southern Austria, police reports said on Monday. The incident came 24 hours after Mayer was the target of a police raid at the Turin Winter Olympics on the Austrian biathlon and cross-country ski team.
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/ 3 February 2006
Austria said on Thursday it would not buy back five masterpieces by Austrian painter Gustav Klimt, but instead return them to a descendant of the paintings’ former Jewish owner whose possessions were seized by the Nazis. Austrian Culture Minister Elisabeth Gehrer said the government did not see how it could spend -million (€248 million) to buy back the paintings.
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/ 1 February 2006
World powers including Russia agreed on Wednesday on a draft resolution asking the United Nations atomic watchdog to report Iran to the UN Security Council over nuclear work that could be weapons-related. The resolution was to be introduced later in the day to the watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency.
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/ 30 January 2006
Qatari Energy Minister Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah joined a growing chorus of voices on Monday calling for the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) to leave production levels unchanged ahead of a meeting in Vienna on Tuesday. He said current high crude prices prevent any lowering of the cartel’s production level.
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/ 27 January 2006
It’s a birthday bash being heard around the world. Salzburg, the cobblestoned and turreted city of Mozart’s birth, was leading Friday’s 250th anniversary celebrations — but the strains of the master’s music were vibrating through every corner of the planet.
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/ 25 January 2006
Wish you could get Mozart on the phone? No problem — and you won’t even have to part with a coin to compose the call. Fifty bright red "Calling Mozart" booths went up around Vienna on Wednesday, two days before Austria celebrates the 250th anniversary of his birth.
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/ 18 January 2006
German ”tax refugees” dodging tough new banking laws at home are taking billions of euros across the border and depositing them in Austrian banks, said the newspaper Die Presse on Wednesday. The Banking Cooperative Federation in Germany’s Bavaria state estimated that last year alone, two billion euros (,4-billion) had flowed from its member-banks to Austria.
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/ 17 January 2006
An Austrian arbitration court ruled on Tuesday that five paintings by Austrian art nouveau painter Gustav Klimt seized by the Nazis should be returned to their owner’s family. The court ruled that "conditions have been met for the five paintings to be given back to the heirs to Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer".
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/ 16 January 2006
Two Syrian intelligence officers began giving evidence in Vienna again on Monday to the United Nations commission investigating the murder 11 months ago of Lebanese former prime minister Rafiq Hariri, a Syrian diplomat said. They are Syria’s former head of intelligence in Lebanon, Rustom Ghazale, and his deputy, retired colonel Samih Kashaami.
Oil prices rose on Monday, hovering above a barrel, and natural-gas futures dropped amid a mild start to winter in the United States. Gasoline prices also eased, but analysts suggested that relatively mild US temperatures would keep demand high and stocks tight.
Austrian United Nations anti-torture envoy Manfred Nowak in an interview published on Monday warned that societies must not put God above human rights. ”If one accepts that divine law is higher than international law, we can close shop,” said Nowak in the Vienna newspaper Kurier.
Heinrich Harrer, an Austrian mountaineer and writer with a Nazi past who fled a British prisoner-of-war camp in India for the northern Himalayas, where he befriended and tutored the Dalai Lama, died on Saturday. He was 93. Actor Brad Pitt played Harrer in the film Seven Years in Tibet.
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/ 26 December 2005
Austria will celebrate the 250th anniversary of Mozart’s birth next year in what promises to be an extravaganza for souvenir hunters. ”The ‘Mozart’ brand is one of the best known in the world,” said Arthur Oberascher, head of the Austrian National Tourist Office, estimating its value at about €5,4-billion.
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/ 22 December 2005
A man who used an oath of loyalty to Adolf Hitler as the greeting on his cellphone answering service went on trial on Thursday in Austria, where such statements are a crime. The 20-year-old defendant, whose name was not released in line with privacy laws, was being tried in the province of Tyrol.
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/ 22 December 2005
The European Union and Iran still seem to be on a collision course over Tehran’s alleged atomic-weapons intentions despite the revival of talks, diplomats and analysts said on Thursday. The EU and Iran resumed talks on Wednesday, agreeing after five hours to meet again in January.
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/ 21 December 2005
Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said on Wednesday Iran will ”not agree to any conditions whatsoever” for the resumption of talks with the European Union on its controversial nuclear programme. Mottaki said Iran is not interested in ”talks about talks” but in discussing how to keep nuclear technology within the country.