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Iran Denies US Allegation on Weapons of Mass Destruction
Iran on Monday denied a US allegation that Iran is making efforts to produce weapons of mass destruction, saying that "Iran which suffered most from chemical weapons has never been acquiring weapons of mass destruction."
"What is threatening the United States are not other countries, but its self-centered and irrational policies on the international scene which have led to further isolation of itself," Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said, quoted by the official IRNA news agency.
The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) claimed in its recent report that Iran is cooperating with foreign "entities" to develop its domestic capability of producing chemical, biological and nuclear weapons plus their delivery systems.
"Iran's defensive and nuclear cooperation with some foreign countries is in the framework of international conventions and aimed at maintaining world peace and security," Asefi said, adding that "the peaceful use of those arms is also in line with the industrial and economic development of the country."
Asefi also castigated the U.S. administration for its unwavering support for the racist Israeli regime, which he claimed is "the biggest threat to the world security and the Middle East" through its stock-pile of weapons of mass destruction.
"The repeated charges by the U.S. officials, along with those by Israel, are made at a time when Israel refuses to let the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspect its nuclear arsenals and continues to make massive deals for purchasing U.S. weapons of mass destruction," said Asefi.
Washington has regularly accused Iran of seeking to acquire weapons of mass destruction since it severed ties with Tehran in 1980 after radical Islamic students took over the former U.S. embassy in Tehran following the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Iran has repeatedly said that the construction of Bushehr nuclear power plant in southern Iran is for civilian purposes and it has opened the facilities for regular checking of IAEA experts.
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