Lula urges dialogue on Iran nuclear weapons issue
Photo: John Evans
Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is calling on the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council to hold direct talks with Iran on the nuclear weapons issue, after the United States military warned Iran could produce enough highly-enriched uranium for a nuclear bomb in one year.
Lula says he has spoken on the matter to US President Barack Obama, whom he said along with other permanent UN security council seat members, China, France, Russia, France and the United Kingdom has yet to hold substantive discussions with Iran on the matter.
But because Brazil’s constitution forbids the country to have nuclear weapons, Lula said it is important that to show others shouldn’t have them too.
“What Brazil can’t have, Iran shouldn’t want,” Lula told reporters outside a steel conference in Sầo Paulo.
At the same time, Lula said he doesn’t want to see a repeat of the 2003 war in Iraq, where suspected chemical weapons led to the invasion spearheaded by the United States and Britain, but were never found.
US military officials say it would take another three to five years for Iran to produce a “deliverable weapon that is usable.”
The warning comes as Iran says it had produced its first significant batch of more highly-enriched uranium.
Negotiations have resumed at the United Nations on a possible Iran sanctions resolution over its nuclear programme.
Lula, who is keen to promote Iran as a trading partner, has been criticised for holding meetings with controversial Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
“As a man of peace I prefer to avoid any type of sanctions to avoid animosity between Iran and the rest of the world further down the road,” the Brazilian president added.
