Special Report: Iran Nuclear Crisis

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad answers questions in a press conference in Tehran, capital of Iran, Aug. 28, 2007. Ahmadinejad said on Tuesday that every country has the right to gain access to peaceful nuclear energy and his country is determined to continue its nuclear program despite opposition from some "big powers."(Xinhua/Xu Yanyan)

     TEHRAN, Aug. 28 (Xinhua) -- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Tuesday that his country is determined to continue its nuclear program despite opposition from some "big powers."

    "According to regulations of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), every country has the right to gain access to peaceful nuclear energy," Ahmadinejad told a press conference in Tehran.

    But some "big powers" would not admit Iran's advancement and want to deprive the Iranians of their "legal rights and peaceful utilization" of nuclear energy, he said.

    "They illegally sent our nuclear case from the IAEA to the UN Security Council...(but) from our point of view, the nuclear issue is over... They could not push us back, " Ahmadinejad said,

    "Today, Iran is a nuclear Iran," Ahmadinejad told reporters. "It means Iran has fully possessed the whole nuclear fuel cycle."

    The Iranian president also dismissed the accusation that Iran is interfering in Iraq's affairs.

    "The insecurity in Iraq is against our interests but in favor of the occupiers," he said.

    Meanwhile, the Iranian president said that a power vacuum would appear in Iraq, and Iran was ready to help fill the gap.

    "The political power of the occupiers is diminished," Ahmadinejad said, referring to U.S. troops in Iraq.

    "There would be a vacuum of political power in the region in the near future," he said. "We know this and we are ready to fill the gap with the cooperation of some other neighbors such as Saudi Arabia."

    On March 24, the UN Security Council unanimously adopted a new resolution, the second punitive one, with tougher sanctions to pressure Iran to suspend its uranium enrichment activities.

    However, an IAEA report in May said that Iran continued to resist the UN Security Council ban on enrichment and instead was expanding its activities.

Bush issues fresh warning against Iran

    WASHINGTON, Aug. 28 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President George W. Bush said Tuesday that Iran's actions threaten the security of nations everywhere and the United States is ready to confront the danger.

    "Iran's active pursuit of technology that could lead to nuclear weapons threatens to put a region already known for instability and violence under the shadow of a nuclear holocaust," Bush said in a speech to the American Legion veterans group in Reno, Nevada. Full story