TEHRAN, 28 September 2005 — Iran threatened yesterday to use trade to punish countries that have voted to report it to the UN Security Council for possible sanctions, after Tehran failed to convince the world its nuclear program was peaceful.
Iranian officials said they were shocked by India’s backing on Saturday for a resolution passed by the UN’s nuclear watchdog body, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
But they reassured India, which is hoping to satisfy its voracious appetite for energy through deals with the world’s second biggest holder of oil and natural gas, that it would not take any hasty action.
“We will reconsider our economic cooperation with those countries that voted against us,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told reporters at a weekly news conference.
“India’s vote came as a great surprise to us,” he added.
India’s delegation was one of the 22 which voted against Iran at the IAEA, out of a total 35.
But Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani said Iran was willing to continue its “friendly” relationship with India. “We should not lose a friend because of one incident,” Larijani told reporters. “We will have talks with India over Iran’s nuclear ambitions in the future.”
Analysts had predicted Iran could use oil as a lever against countries seeking to send Iran to the Security Council. But such a move could backfire. Oil accounts for 80 percent of Iran’s export earnings and interrupting that flow of hard cash would be politically risky.
India had no immediate reaction to Asefi’s remarks but its foreign secretary, Shyam Saran, said on Monday New Delhi’s stance at the IAEA should not cause much trouble.
