Missing Iran scientist says he escaped U.S. agents: report
TEHRAN |
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's state television aired what it said was footage of a missing nuclear scientist on Tuesday, the third video to emerge in weeks giving conflicting accounts of the fate of a man Tehran says was kidnapped by the CIA.
Shahram Amiri, a university researcher working for Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, disappeared during a pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia a year ago and Tehran accused Riyadh of handing him over to the United States, which Saudi Arabia has denied.
Earlier this month Iranian television showed a first video of a man it said was Amiri. In the footage, Amiri said he had been kidnapped, taken to the United States and tortured.
However shortly after that footage, a second video appeared on the Internet, also purporting to be Amiri, in which he said he was actually studying in the United States.
"It's ludicrous for anyone to suggest that this individual was kidnapped by the United States," a U.S. official in Washington said on Tuesday. "If he's able to produce videos, it defies human logic to allege that he's somehow been held against his will by Americans."
In Tuesday's video, the man described as Amiri said he had fled from U.S. "agents" and was in hiding. He rejected the Internet footage as "a sheer lie," and urged human rights groups to help him return to Iran.
"Minutes ago I managed to escape American security agents in the state of Virginia. I am now in a safe place making this video," the man purporting to be Amiri said in the latest film.
"I could be arrested again by American security agents any minute ... I am not free here and I do not have permission to contact my family or others and if anything happens to me or if I do not return to (my) country, the American government is directly responsible," he added.
The man in all the videos looked similar to photographs of Amiri that have appeared previously in Iranian media, although none of them could be independently verified by Reuters.
Iran summoned the Swiss ambassador in Tehran earlier this month and handed over documents which it said showed Amiri had been kidnapped by the United States.
Iran has no diplomatic relations with the United States and U.S. interests in Tehran are handled by the Swiss embassy.
In March, ABC news said Amiri had defected to the United States and was helping the CIA. A CIA spokeswoman declined to comment on the U.S. network's report.
Tehran originally refused to acknowledge Amiri's involvement in Iran's disputed nuclear program, which the West fears is being used to develop nuclear weapons. Iran says it is aimed at generating electricity.
Three months after Amiri's disappearance Iran disclosed the existence of its second uranium enrichment site, further heightening tension over the Islamic state's atomic activities.
(Additional reporting by Adam Entous in Washington, Editing by Peter Graff and Sandra Maler)
- Tweet this
- Link this
- Share this
- Digg this
- Reprints
US continues its annual $3 billion assistance to Israel, despite an American law forbidding aid to any country producing weapons of mass destruction. Not only did ISRAEL THREATEN TO SEND SYRIA BACK TO STONE AGE, did Massacre on Freedom Flotilla BUT ALSO Israel offered to sell apartheid-era South Africa nuclear warheads in 1975.Israel opposes creating a nuclear weapons-free zone until Middle East peace has been achieved.
Iran is a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, is at the moment
FULLY in compliance with it, has no nuclear arsenal, and does not even have a
nuclear weapons program. (The treaty allows countries to enrich uranium for fuel, which is all that Iran
is known to be doing). NPT signatories have treaty-based rights to seek civilian energy production, either by enriching uranium or separating plutonium.
Article IV: 1. Nothing in this Treaty shall be interpreted as affecting the inalienable right of all the Parties to the Treaty to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes without discrimination and in conformity with Articles I and II of this Treaty.
2. All the Parties to the Treaty undertake to facilitate, and have the right to participate in, the fullest possible exchange of equipment, materials and scientific and technological information for the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. Parties to the Treaty in a position to do so shall also co-operate in contributing alone or together with other States or international organizations to the further development of the applications of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, especially in the territories of non-nuclear-weapon States Party to the Treaty, with due consideration for the needs of the developing areas of the world.
In addition, the International Atomic Energy Agency has conducted numerous inspections of Iran’s nuclear facilities but has never found any evidence showing that Iran’s civilian nuclear program has been diverted to nuclear weapons production.
IRAN IS NOT A THREAT TO WORLD PEACE.
HISTORY SHOWS, IRAN NEVER ATTACKED OR INVADED OTHER COUNTRIES USING FAKED JUSTIFICATION SUCH AS IRAQ WAR WITH NEVER-BEEN-FOUND WMD.
IN FACT, OBAMA TO MAKE WORLD WAR III ON BEHALF OF UNBREAKABLE BOND ISRAEL, TO MAKE IRAN LIKE WAR-TORN IRAQ WHERE A BOMB GOES UP DAILY FOREVER.
Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter sets out the UN Security Council’s powers to maintain peace. It allows the Council to “determine the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression” and to take military and nonmilitary action to “restore international peace and security”.
CHAPTER VII OF THE UNITED NATIONS CHARTER ARTICLE 51 PROVIDES FOR THE RIGHT OF COUNTRIES TO ENGAGE IN MILITARY ACTION IN SELF DEFENSE, INCLUDING COLLECTIVE SELF DEFENSE FOR IRAN.
Follow Reuters