U.S.: Meeting Set For New Iran Sanctions

Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said Thursday he will travel to London on Monday to meet with the United States' negotiating partners to try to draft a new resolution to sanction Iran.

Burns spoke hours after the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency said Iran has ignored a Security Council resolution to freeze uranium enrichment, a possible step toward nuclear weapons.

Burns said he hopes the United States and other permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, plus Germany, can quickly draft a resolution to "see Iran repudiated again." He said it was too soon to say what provisions the resolution might contain.

"It is effectively thumbing its nose at the international community," Burns said of Iran. He spoke at the Carnegie Endowment think tank.

But with Russia and China, both permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, still doing a lot of business with Iran, tougher sanctions than those already in place are unlikely, reports CBS News chief White House correspondent Jim Axelrod.

The International Atomic Energy Agency's conclusion — while widely expected — was important because it could serve as the trigger for the council to start deliberating on new sanctions meant to punish Tehran for its nuclear intransigence.

In a report written by IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei, the agency reported that Iran now has hundreds of devices called centrifuges that spin uranium into nuclear fuel and plans to have thousands more ready by May, reports Axelrod.

The report also said the Islamic republic continues construction of a reactor that will use heavy water and a heavy water production plant — also in defiance of the Security Council.

Both enriched uranium and plutonium produced by heavy water reactors can produce the fissile material used in nuclear warheads. Iran denies such intentions, saying it needs the heavy water reactor to produce radioactive isotopes for medical and other peaceful purposes and enrichment to generate energy.

The six-page report also said that agency experts remain "unable ... to make further progress in its efforts to verify fully the past development of Iran's nuclear program" due to lack of Iranian cooperation.

That, too, put it in violation of the Security Council, which on Dec. 23 told Tehran to "provide such access and cooperation as the agency requests to be able to verify ... all outstanding issues" within 60 days.

The report — sent both to the Security Council and the agency's 35 board member nations — set the stage for a fresh showdown between Iran and Western powers.

In Washington, the State Department called Iran's refusal to comply with the Security Council demands "a missed opportunity for the Iranian government and the Iranian people.

Deputy spokesman Tom Casey noted that the U.S. position is that the Security Council should convene to take additional steps beyond those approved last December.

He said he was confident that additional sanctions will be approved but he declined to predict what they might be.

On Wednesday, as the U.N. deadline expired, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad pledged to push ahead with his country's nuclear program and said his people would not bow to Western intimidation.

"The enemy is making a big mistake if it thinks it can thwart the will of the Iranian nation to achieve the peaceful use of nuclear technology," he was quoted as saying on the official state television web site.

"Iran is sounding a more defiant tone than ever," said CBS News foreign affairs analyst Pamela Falk, "leaving the administration with the choice of trying to pressure other resistant members of the U.N. to pass tougher sanctions, to implicitly threaten military force or to negotiate under Iran's terms, none of which are very good options."