Iraq strives to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, Oil Minister:

BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: Iraq shall strive to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, following the issuance of the UN Security Council resolution to lift the sanctions against Iraq in this respect, the Undersecretary of the Iraqi Oil Ministry, Assem Jihad, said on Saturday. Jihad quoted Oil Minister, Hussein al-Shahrestani, as having stated for IraqiNews.com news agency that his country “is striving to develop and activate the nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, with local potentials and efficiencies, because it possesses a very special program, compared with other developing nations, but the former (Baath) regime had transformed the program for other purposes.” U.S. Vice-President, Joseph Biden, had sannounced in a speech in the UN Security Council’s session on Wednesday that the Council had lifted the sanctions, issued against Iraq after its invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Jihad, on his part, had quoted Minister Shahrestani as saying that Iraq would exert efforts to activate the peaceful aspect of the nuclear energy in the field of nuclear radiation, in medicine, agriculture, industry and other fields.” The Chairman of the Iraqi National Committee for Atomic Energy, Fuad al-Mousawi, has expressed satisfaction for the UN Security Council’s Resolution to lift the sanctions imposed on Iraq‘s peaceful use of the nuclear energy, saying that “it had come at the right time, due to the country’s  need for the energy in different fields.” SKH 1