VIENNA (AFP) - The UN atomic agency adopted a resolution setting a November 25 deadline for a full review of Iran's alleged nuclear weapons program, with Tehran vowing to cooperate but warning it may defy the agency's call to suspend uranium enrichment.
Britain, France and Germany had submitted the resolution, which was strongly opposed by non-aligned countries which are against imposing a deadline on Iran to suspend uranium enrichment, the process for making fuel for nuclear reactors but also the explosive material for atomic bombs.
"The resolution was adopted by consensus, without a vote," International Atomic Energy Agency spokeswoman Melissa Fleming told reporters at a meeting of the IAEA's 35-nation board of governors, as the non-aligned movement states gave up on pushing for amendments to the text.
The United States claims Iran is secretly developing nuclear weapons and has been lobbying strongly here for decisive action against the Islamic Republic.
Washington pressed for an October 31 ultimatum for Tehran to fully suspend uranium enrichment and report on its other activities to the IAEA, and for Iran to be automatically referred to the UN Security Council for possible sanctions if it failed to do so.
But in a compromise, Washington and the so-called Euro 3 -- Britain, France and Germany -- set a November 25 deadline for a full review of Iran's nuclear program and called on Tehran to "immediately" suspend all uranium enrichment activities, with this also being reviewed in November.
But no specific IAEA action was stipulated, according to a copy of the resolution obtained by AFP.
Just the same, US delegation chief Jackie Sanders said "this resolution sends an unmistakable signal to Iran that continuing its nuclear weapons program will bring it inevitably before the Security Council."
Iranian delegation chief Hossein Mousavian said Iran would continue to cooperate with the IAEA but felt free to resume uranium enrichment if it so decides.
He said Iran would decide in the next "two or three days" whether to resume enriching uranium.
Iran suspended enrichment in October 2003 as a confidence-building measure but has continued support activities such as building the centrifuges that refine the uranium.
It recently alarmed the United States by saying that it would be carrying out the first stage of the nuclear fuel cycle, making the uranium gas that is the feed for centrifuges.
IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei said however that Iran must suspend all enrichment activities in order to restore confidence after having hid its nuclear activities for almost two decades, as the IAEA has documented in reports in an investigation that began in February 2003.
The United States reserves the right to take strong diplomatic action if Iran fails to suspend enrichment, US Undersecretary of State John Bolton told AFP Saturday.
"We have the option to do something before November. We are not now going to sleep until November," he said by telephone from Washington.
Bolton said the United States could call on the IAEA to meet earlier than the planned next board of governors meeting in November if the suspension was not working out.
The United States could on its own call on the UN Security Council to look into Iran's alleged nuclear weapons program, diplomats said.
The United States wants to put an end to the 19-month-old IAEA investigation of Iran, as Washington thinks it is dragging on, giving Iran breathing space in which to pursue secret weapons activities.
German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer urged Iran to "seize the chance" offered by the resolution and said that it is of "central importance that Iran suspend all activities connected with enrichment" of uranium, in a statement issued from Berlin.
Non-aligned states had wanted to avoid making uranium enrichment, which is allowed under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), something for which Iran can be sanctioned as they "fear that depriving Iran of enrichment would set a precedent for other states to be kept away from key atomic technologies."
They wanted the IAEA only to judge Iran on its compliance with NPT safeguards, which focus on the diversion of nuclear material for military purposes.
But German IAEA ambassador Herbert Honsowitz told the IAEA board that actions against Iran would not set a precedent for stopping states from getting peaceful nuclear technology.
A European diplomat said the call to suspend uranium enrichment was too important to drop since controlling the nuclear fuel cycle is the key to building a bomb, a "breakout capacity" Iran should not have even if it is not overtly diverting nuclear materials for military purposes.