TEHRAN (FNA)- The Iranian foreign ministry welcomed the UN Security Council's opposition to the alleged report sponsored by certain members that Tehran's missile program has violated the international sanctions."Certain member states at the UNSC tried to display Iran's missile program which has a completely defensive nature as a violation of the sanctions, but it was opposed by the other members," Foreign Ministry Spokesman Seyed Abbas Araqchi said in his weekly press conference in Tehran on Tuesday.
He underlined the defensive and legitimate nature of Iran's missile program, and condemned the enemies' attempts to display the program in a different way.
"We dont consider such moves constructive and if they seek to put pressure (on Iran) in the nuclear issue, (they should know that) it will not be effective," Araqchi said.
A UN Security Council committee is split over whether Iran's missile tests last year violated UN sanctions imposed on Tehran because of its nuclear and ballistic missile programs, Australia's UN envoy said on Monday.
That division effectively rules out any expansion of sanctions against Tehran over the tests for the time being, UN envoys told Reuters on condition of anonymity.
Diplomats said it was Russia, backed by China, that refused to declare Tehran's missile launches a violation of the UN restrictions.
The rift on the Iran sanctions committee, which consists of all 15 Security Council members, highlights the difficulties Western powers face in persuading other memebers to join them in keeping up the pressure on Tehran to halt its peaceful nuclear and missile work.
Washington and its Western allies accuse Iran of trying to develop nuclear weapons under the cover of a civilian nuclear program, while they have never presented any corroborative evidence to substantiate their allegations. Iran denies the charges and insists that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only.
Tehran stresses that the country has always pursued a civilian path to provide power to the growing number of Iranian population, whose fossil fuel would eventually run dry.
Despite the rules enshrined in the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) entitling every member state, including Iran, to the right of uranium enrichment, Tehran is now under four rounds of UN Security Council sanctions and the western embargos for turning down West's calls to give up its right of uranium enrichment.
Tehran has dismissed West's demands as politically tainted and illogical, stressing that sanctions and pressures merely consolidate Iranians' national resolve to continue the path.
The Islamic Republic says that it considers its nuclear case closed as it has come clean of IAEA's questions and suspicions about its past nuclear activities.
By Fars News Agency
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