IAEA board meets to take up reports on Syria, Iran

Nov 27, 2008, 9:09 GMT

Vienna - The governing board of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) gathered Thursday in Vienna to discuss alleged secret nuclear activities in Syria and Iran.

In its regular November meeting, the 35-country board plans to take up the IAEA's first report on Syria, which noted that an alleged nuclear site that was destroyed by Israel in September 2007 had similarities to a reactor.

Without drawing any conclusions, IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei also noted in the report issued last week that his agency's inspectors had found uranium particles at the al-Kibar site during a first visit in June.

Syria has stated that al-Kibar was a conventional military site and that the uranium must have originated from munitions used by the Israeli air force to destroy the installation.

The IAEA board is also set to discuss ElBaradei's latest report on Iran, in which he stated his concern that the country was not answering open questions on past studies that were possibly related to nuclear weapons development.

The report also noted that Iran was continuing to enrich uranium, defying United Nations Security Council which has passed sanctions to pressure the country into suspending this activity.

While the Iranian leadership insists it needs enriched uranium to fuel its nuclear power plant, the Security Council is concerned that the nuclear material could one day be used for nuclear weapons.