Iran officially denied Wednesday that key nuclear equipment had disappeared from a facility in Tehran, saying a corresponding report by the UN atomic watchdog was "wrong".

And Iran's envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency Ali Asghar Soltanieh said the Islamic republic was intent on enriching uranium to higher levels of purification in case an international deal aimed at supplying much-needed fuel for a research reactor fell through.

"We are writing officially to the (International Atomic Energy) Agency that the paragraph 28 (in the IAEA's latest report on Iran) is wrong," Tehran's envoy to the watchdog, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, told reporters here.

"Nothing has been removed and therefore this scenario, this story and whatever had been said is wrong, absolutely."

In a new restricted report circulated to member states earlier this week, and a copy of which was obtained by AFP, the IAEA said that during a visit to a laboratory in February, UN inspectors had noticed that a component of some pyroprocessing equipment previously present "had been removed".

Pyroprocessing is a technique used to separate uranium or plutonium from spent fuel and some experts are concerned about the possible weaponisation implications of such work.

And the fact that such equipment had gone missing has been interpreted by some as sign of a possible cover-up on the part of Iran.

Nevertheless, a senior diplomat familiar with the IAEA's Iran investigation said the information had not set alarm bells within the agency at this stage, since it was only one piece of a large apparatus, a container-like vessel, that had been removed, while all the other more important components remained in place.

Iranian ambassador Soltanieh said Iran would insist that IAEA chief Yukiya Amano correct the offending paragraph in the report.

Asked where the equipment now was, Soltanieh replied: "Everything is as it was. Everything is there. They just make a fuss out of something which was not correct."

Soltanieh also said that Iran would continue to enrich uranium to around 20 percent purification in case a fuel supply deal for a reactor making radio-isotopes for cancer treatment fell through.

"As long as the fuel is not in the core of the reactor, we cannot be sure" that Iran will actually get it, the ambassador said.

"We have a serious confidence deficit regarding the fuel supply," Soltanieh said.

"Since we have been facing an absence of any legally binding assurance of supply, we have to have our own fuel. We have to have the fuel back-up, contingency for both Bushehr power plant and the Tehran Research Reactor," he said.

Earlier this year, Iran started enriching uranium to 20 percent purification, ostensibly to make the fuel for the research reactor.

In its latest report, the IAEA said Iran had produced at least 5.7 kilos (12.5 pounds) of the higher-enriched uranium.

The uranium enrichment activities are at the heart of western fears about Iran's nuclear programme, because enriched uranium can be used not only to produce energy, but also the fissile core of an atomic bomb.

Last October, the United States, France and Russia proposed taking Iran's stockpile of low-enriched uranium and turn it into to the fuel rods for the reactor.

But Iran refused to take up the offer and has drawn up an alternative deal with Brazil and Turkey instead.

The west, for its part, says the new deal does not go far enough and it argues that Iran does not need to enrich to 20 percent, because it does not have the technology to turn that material into the fuel rods for the reactor.

earlier related report
US seeks UN vote on Iran sanctions by June 21
Washington (AFP) June 2, 2010 - The United States said Thursday it hopes for a UN Security Council vote by June 21 on tough new sanctions against Iran over what it calls its continued failure to curb its nuclear ambitions.

"We are going to put forward this resolution in the coming days. And we expect all responsible members of the international community... to support the resolution," State Department spokesman Philip Crowley told reporters.

"The president (Barack Obama) has indicated he wants to see this accomplished by the end of spring," he said, later clarifying that he meant a vote on the resolution by June 20 or June 21.

A senior State Department official later told reporters on the condition of anonymity that "sometime between now and June 20 I expect that this issue will come to a vote before the Security Council."

He said a report Monday by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN nuclear watchdog, underscores what he called Iran's continued failure to comply with its international obligations over its disputed atomic program.

Last month the United States introduced a draft resolution to impose tough new sanctions on Iran, saying it had the support of the four other permanent veto-wielding Security Council members: Russia, China, Britain and France.

The draft would expand an arms embargo and measures against Iran's banking sector and ban Tehran from sensitive overseas activities like uranium mining and developing ballistic missiles.

Senior US officials said Friday they were forging ahead with a resolution without Brazil and Turkey, two non-permanent Security Council members that brokered a nuclear fuel swap deal with Iran aimed at forestalling sanctions.

Western powers fear Iran's atomic program is a cover for a nuclear weapons drive. Tehran denies this, saying it is aimed at peaceful energy use, which it insists it has the right to pursue.

Iran is already subject to three sets of UN sanctions for its refusal to suspend uranium enrichment, one of the crucial steps towards the production of nuclear energy for civil or military use.

In a restricted report revealed on Monday, the IAEA said Iran is pressing ahead with its controversial atomic program, producing enriched uranium at higher levels of purification and installing more machinery.

The atomic watchdog said Iran had produced at least 5.7 kilos (12.5 pounds) of higher-enriched uranium, adding that it remained concerned about the true nature of the nuclear activities.