TEHRAN -- Iran’s nuclear issue was illegally transferred to the United Nation Security Council, said Ali-Asghar Soltanieh, Iran’s ambassador to International Atomic Energy Agency.

Speaking at IAEA board of governors meeting in Vienna on Wednesday, Soltanieh said that the issue has to be returned to the agency.
He added Iran does not consider any legal basis for the UN resolutions that have been issued against Tehran contrary to the “international law”.
He also said that the “illegal involvement” of the Security Council in a “technical issue” which should be studied by the IAEA as a technical body has complicated the situation and damaged the required “mutual trust” among member states and the IAEA Secretariat, and put “credibility” of the agency into question.
He said the sanctions imposed on the country have not only prevented the nuclear enrichment by Iran but have further united Iranians to protect their “national interest”.
Moreover, the sanctions have made Iranians more determined to make use of nuclear energy as their “inalienable right” for peaceful purposes, he added.
He said certain IAEA members, through their “boring, repetitive, unjustified and frustrating statements”, are trying to keep the Iran issue on the agenda of the IAEA board even at “the cost of the credibility of the agency.”
Soltanieh said those few Western countries that have been putting pressure on Iran for its nuclear program have only two options: Cooperation with Iran or isolation!
They should acknowledge the reality of Iran as an advanced country that has mastered uranium enrichment technology and at the same time a “responsible state fully committed to its legal obligation”