UNITED NATIONS, Dec 22: The UN Security Council on Friday decided to delay vote on a proposed draft resolution to impose technical sanctions on Iran for its refusal to halt its nuclear enrichment programme, on Russian request, diplomats here said.
The vote is now expected on Saturday.
“I do not believe the vote will take place on Friday,” Russian Ambassador to the United Nations Vitaly Churkin said on Thursday after unofficial consultations of six major powers (five Security Council permanent members – US, Britain, France, Russia and China plus Germany).
“It is clear that we shall use Friday for additional discussions of the draft resolution,” Churkin said, adding the vote may take place on Saturday.
British, French and US diplomats said after the consultations the Security Council would vote on the draft resolution on Friday.
But Churkin said Russia “continues to insist on its principle approach to the given resolution” that it should refer specifically to the nuclear programme of the country, rather than to companies and personalities.
“There are several spheres linked to the Iranian nuclear programme, which have to be restricted by the resolution.” As far as other fields of cooperation are concerned, “there should be no obstacles for it. At present we are trying to make it clear to the maximum, what is banned and what is allowed by the resolution”, Churkin said.
He said Russia insisted that the talk should be “directly about (nuclear) activities, not about personalities or companies”. The draft resolution has an attached list of legal entities and private individuals, whose financial assets should be frozen for involvement in the Iranian nuclear and missile programme.
“The task is to ensure that the activities not linked to the dubious aspects of the Iranian nuclear programme should not be restricted or banned,” the Russian ambassador said.
The six major powers resolved the problem regarding a travel ban on Iranian officials linked to the nuclear and missile programme. “However other complicated technical issues remain and need to be agreed upon. The devil is often in the details, as they say, and we encountered serious technical issues regarding the details, the understanding and the implementation of the resolution. Those are details, which we cannot brush aside and which have to be fully clarified,” Churkin said. That is necessary “to avoid future problems for those companies and organisations, which are engaged in completely lawful cooperation with Iran and Iranian companies, which has nothing to do with the dubious aspects of the nuclear programme,” he stressed.
Qatar’s Ambassador Nasser Abdelaziz al-Nasser, who chairs the council for December, said: “Tomorrow we are going to take action” on the draft.
US acting Ambassador Alejandro Wolff for his part said: “The Europeans have the decision on this. We’ll see if we can do it tomorrow. That’s our hope.”
