Iran, Russia delay nuclear fuel deal
Tehran, Iran Iran and Russia suddenly postponed on Saturday the signing of a key deal to supply Iran with fuel for its first nuclear reactor, and officials from the two countries were holding new talks, apparently to resolve last-minute differences.
The agreement had been scheduled to be signed Saturday morning. But after hours of delay, Yacoub Jabbarian, an official at Iran’s Atomic Energy Agency, said that talks had been prolonged and it was not clear when the signing would take place.
The agreement had been worked out in months of negotiations between Moscow and Tehran. The deal would pave the way for Iran to bring its nuclear reactor at Bushehr online, with Russia providing it fuel then taking back the spent fuel, a safeguard meant to banish fears Iran would use it to build nuclear weapons.
The United States strongly opposes the agreement, saying the Iranians could use the reactor as part of a nuclear weapons program.
Egypt to add names to presidential ballot
Cairo, Egypt Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak on Saturday ordered a revision of the country’s election laws and said multiple candidates could run in the nation’s presidential elections, a scenario Mubarak hasn’t faced since taking power in 1981.
The surprise announcement, a response to critics’ calls for political reform, comes shortly after historic elections in Iraq and the Palestinian territories, balloting that brought a taste of democracy to the region.
“The election of a president will be through direct, secret balloting, giving the chance for political parties to run for the presidential elections and providing guarantees that allow more than one candidate for the people to choose among them with their own will,” Mubarak said on Egyptian television.
Mubarak – who has never faced an opponent since becoming president after the 1981 assassination of Anwar Sadat – said his initiative came “out of my full conviction of the need to consolidate efforts for more freedom and democracy.”
Japan has 15th case of mad cow disease
Tokyo Japan has confirmed its 15th case of mad cow disease in a cow from the country’s north, the government said Saturday.
The 8-year-old Holstein cow was already dead when it was brought in for testing from a ranch in Hobetsu, Hokkaido state, earlier this week.
Preliminary tests indicated it had the fatal brain-wasting disease, and more precise tests conducted at a state-run research center near Tokyo confirmed those results, the Agriculture Ministry said.
On Feb. 4, Japan confirmed its first human case of mad cow disease following the death of a man with symptoms of the illness. Japanese health authorities have said it was likely the man contracted the disease while living for a month in Britain – where mad cow first surfaced – in 1989.
Tokyo has checked every slaughtered cow before it enters the food supply since 2001, after its first discovery of mad cow disease, known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE.