Iraq’s Nuclear Program needs US$4-5 billions (b), 10 years, for implementation, Minister:

BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: The Iraqi Minister of Science & Technology, Raid Fahmi, has said on Sunday that according to the new UN Security Council’s resolution to lift sanctions against Iraq, “nothing exists any longer to exploit the nuclear energy for peaceful purposes,” adding that “Iraq needs at least 10 years to implement its program for peaceful use of nuclear energy, in addition to its financial costs that range between US$4-5 billions (b). “The new Security Council resolution has lifted all sanctions preventing Iraq to enter into the peaceful use of the nuclear energy,” Fahmi told the independent al-Alam Newspaper here on Sunday, adding that “Iraq, if it decides to implement the Resolution, as we understand it, it will be able to build several electro-nuclear power projects, i.e. electric-power generation stations, that operate with the use of nuclear energy.” Minister Fahmi said that “Iraq had been finding it difficult to implement such projects due to UN Charter’s 7th Article; but now it can obtain research reactors and reactors to generate power, thing that shall open new horizons for the use of nuclear energy in different fields, including medical, water resources and agricultural fields.” U.S. Vice President, Joseph Biden, had told a UN Security Council sesssion last Wednesday that the Council had decided to abolish sancations, issued against Iraq after its occupation of Kuwait in 1990, whilst Iraq‘s Foreign Minister, Hoshiar Zibari, told the session that “Iraq still has a long way to settle its suspended problems with Kuwait.” The Chairman of the Iraqi National Committee for Nuclear Energy, Fuad al-Mousaway, has expressed satisfaction for the UN Security Council’s resolution to lift sanctions imposed on Iraq for its use of nuclear energy for peaceful puroses, saying that the resolution “had come in the right time, due to the country’s need for the nuclear energy in different fields.” “Iraq can obtain a scientific and technical support by the UN Agency for Nuclear Energy and other international agencies, whilst Iraq has efficient experts to initiate such mission in its preliminary stages,” Minister Fahmi concluded. SKH 1