Iranian Foreign Minister: Nuclear weapons are against our religious principles

Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi on Friday reiterated in an interview with the Euronews broadcasting network that building or using nuclear weapons were against the religious principles of his country, IRNA reported.

Asked about western accusations that Iran was trying to develop nuclear weapons, Salehi replied, 'We absolutely refute that. Our supreme leader, who enjoys a religious position, has made a decree which is both religious and governmental.

The decree states that the holding of nuclear weapons, production of nuclear weapons and use of nuclear weapons is against the principles of our religion.'

He reaffirmed that Iran remained strongly committed to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

'We have remained a faithful member of the NPT, we believe in the integrity of the NPT, and we insist on the fact that the production of atomic bombs is against tenets of Islam.”

Salehi pointed to a 'very good cooperation' with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which is overseeing Iran's nuclear program.

'We have very good cooperation with the agency and the agency has explicitly stated this in their report – this last report that was out a fews ago. We have inspectors in my country 24 hours, cameras are working, we have resident inspectors. We opened up our nuclear installations to outside visitors from all over the world,” the minister said.

Tehran has time and again made clear that cooperation with the Vienna-based UN nuclear watchdog was purely technical and should not be politicized by certain western powers.


/Trend/