LEAD: Iran to boycott forum on nuke-free Middle East

Nov 18, 2011, 18:32 GMT

Vienna - Iran will not take part in a meeting of Middle Eastern countries next week that could be a preliminary step towards negotiating a nuclear weapons ban in the region, Tehran's envoy said Friday in Vienna.

The Islamic Republic is the only Middle Eastern country boycotting the forum hosted by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna on Monday and Tuesday.

Israel has said it will attend the forum, which will not feature negotiations, but will allow Middle Eastern countries to learn about existing nuclear-weapon-free zones in Africa, Asia, as well as Latin America and the Caribbean.

Iran's Ambassador Ali Asghar Soltanieh argued that it did not make sense to hold such a meeting as long as Israel had nuclear weapons.

'Therefore, I am afraid we will not participate,' he told reporters.

The IAEA's latest tough report on Iran and Friday's IAEA board resolution which urged Iran to answer questions about alleged nuclear weapons projects had also influenced Tehran's decision, Soltanieh said.

IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano, who had issued the invitation for the Middle East meeting, had created a confrontational atmosphere and was biased towards Israel, he added.

'He is afraid to criticize Israel,' Soltanieh said, referring to that country's nuclear arsenal.

It took the IAEA a decade to organize the conference, because of squabbles between Israel and Arab countries over the agenda.

Israel has said it views the forum as purely informational and not as a venue for negotiations.

Israel is the only country in the region widely believed to have nuclear arms. It has a policy of neither confirming nor denying the existence of such an arsenal.

Iran denies that it is working on nuclear weapons, despite the IAEA's latest report which contains many indications that Iran has been working towards building a nuclear warhead.

The Vienna forum is not officially related to a conference to be held next year on setting up a nuclear weapons ban in the Middle East.

'But if it is successful, it may be a building block towards 2012,' Jan Petersen, the Norwegian diplomat chairing the forum, said this week before Iran had announced it would not attend.

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