Updated on
Summary
The closed door meeting at the US mission to the United Nations in New York included envoys from the five veto-wielding members of the UN Security Council - the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China - plus Germany ended with a conclusion that Iran could produce enough highly enriched uranium needed for a single nuclear bomb in as little as one year but would probably need three to five years to build an atomic weapon.It was the second meeting in a week since China, which has close economic ties with Iran, agreed to join the talks. General James Cartwright, vice chairman of the US military's Joint Chiefs of Staff, concurred: They have enough low enriched uranium now that, if they further processed and enriched that, that in a year ... they would have enough material for one weapon.The US and its Western allies are pressing for quick adoption of an array of tough sanctions. On the table at the closed-door meeting was a draft UN resolution circulated by the US in January. It focuses on five areas - strengthening the existing arms embargo, punishing members of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, new sanctions on energy, and strengthened sanctions on shipping, and further ones on finance, a UN diplomat said. Both China and Russia are still hoping that diplomacy will lead Iran to negotiate and have indicated they will only agree to much weaker measures if Tehran refuses. Although President Barack Obama has called for Security Council action in weeks, a diplomatic source said the gap between the two sides is wide, and it's much more likely that a resolution will not be put to a vote until June.
