'IAEA aims to spy on Iran from Turkmenistan'

An Iranian Analyst has warned the UN nuclear watchdog against a decision to set up a nuclear test detection station in Turkmenistan near the border with Iran.

"The Comprehensive (Nuclear) Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) is a security and spy treaty. It is even more dangerous than the Additional Protocol [to the Non-Proliferation Treaty]," Iran's former ambassador to Italy Abolfazl Zohrehvand told the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) on Wednesday.

"Under the CTBT any form of nuclear activity can be controlled and stopped. It means that the treaty can be used to block peaceful nuclear activities or even to counter missile tests of countries," he added.

The senior diplomat noted that the CTBT is in serious contradiction with the principle of the countries' sovereignty.

"The facilities are installed in various countries as seismograph station… Currently a station is planned to be set up in Turkmenistan, which has the shortest distance with Iran," he said.

He expressed confidence that other stations have been planned in certain neighboring countries to "complete a control belt over Iran in an attempt to keep a close watch on the nuclear activities of countries like Iran."

Zohrehvand said that information the stations gather will be " will be directly sent to a seismograph center in Vienna," adding that the host country has no access to the information.

Last month, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)'s Board of Governors passed a new resolution against Iran over the construction of its Fordo enrichment plant, located outside Tehran.

While resolutions passed by the Board of Governors generally focus on technical issues — as opposed to political ones — and are usually either passed or rejected unanimously, the November 27 resolution failed to win the support of ten member states.

Tehran has maintained that it will continue cooperation with the IAEA, but has also warned that attempts aimed at denying Iran its nuclear rights could reduce the country's cooperation to "a legally mandated minimum," which means it would not venture beyond its legal obligations.

Tehran has, however, asserted that despite mounting Western pressure it will not pull out of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).