Iran gives IAEA uranium papers before report

By Mark Heinrich

VIENNA (Reuters) - Iran has turned over a long-withheld blueprint showing how to mould uranium metal into spheres for nuclear warheads, meeting a demand of U.N. investigators ahead of a watchdog report, diplomats said.

But some diplomats said while the report was likely to say Iran has improved cooperation with a long-running inquiry into its nuclear program, this might not yet be enough to resolve any key questions about the scope and nature of the effort.

The timing and toughness of any further U.N. sanctions against Iran will hinge on world powers' interpretation of the International Atomic Energy Agency report and a parallel report by the EU's top diplomat on recent dialogue with Tehran.

Diplomats have little doubt the European Union's Javier Solana will confirm that Iran remains unwilling to suspend uranium enrichment, which Iran says is to generate electricity but the West suspects is to make atom bombs.

Tehran's continued defiance of U.N. Security Council demands to stop enrichment alone would trigger moves to wider sanctions in the view of the United States, Britain, France and Germany, citing a game plan agreed in September with Russia and China.

A senior diplomat close to the IAEA said a top Iranian nuclear official turned over the uranium metals document at a meeting in the agency's headquarters in Vienna last week.

IAEA inspectors came upon the document accidentally in 2005 while examining Iranian nuclear facilities suspected to have military dimensions. Iran had allowed inspectors to look at but not make copies of the document for investigative purposes.#

UNSOLICITED BLUEPRINT