Iran challenge hits meeting on ailing nuclear treaty

By Mark Heinrich

VIENNA (Reuters) - A meeting on how to rescue the faltering nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty ran into early difficulty on Monday when Iran balked at plans to focus on non-compliance issues, fearing it would be singled out.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon earlier said the NPT was suffering a "crisis of confidence" due to a lack of universal respect for provisions against the spread of nuclear fuel production technology -- an allusion to Iran and North Korea.

Analysts say the NPT has been gravely wounded by North Korea's nuclear test in 2006, after bolting the NPT, and Iran's bid to enrich uranium in defiance of U.N. resolutions demanding that it stop due to suspicions of a covert quest for atom bombs.

Iran insists its uranium enrichment program is only to generate electricity, and an envoy interrupted the NPT review meeting on Monday to contest the tentatively agreed agenda.

He said a line citing the need to consider "approaches and measures to realize its (NPT) purpose, reaffirming the need for full compliance", should be deleted so the agenda would echo that of a 2005 NPT review conference.

"We don't want a certain direction given to the agenda. This item could create disputes by creating too much focus on one country," Iranian envoy Ali Asghar Soltanieh told reporters.

Germany, on behalf of the European Union, and Canada told the gathering of 189 NPT members that Iran's maneuver risked procedural deadlock pre-empting urgent debate on substance as occurred at the 2005 conference.

They said the Vienna meeting chairman, Japan, had ensured the new agenda would allow any nation including Iran to have its say on any topic, so there were no grounds for blocking it.