Iran accuses four of nuclear sabotage

At least four people have been arrested in Iran for trying to sabotage a nuclear site, an Iranian official was quoted by Iranian media as saying on Sunday.

The head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, Ali Akbar Salehi, said officials had monitored and then arrested a "number of saboteurs" before they could carry out their plan.

"Four of these individuals were caught red-handed and their interrogations are ongoing," he was quoted as saying by the Mehr news agency Sunday, but did not release any further details about the incident.

Israel, widely believed to be the region's only nuclear-armed state, sees Iran's atomic work as a military threat and has actively discouraged the United States from pursuing a more conciliatory politics with Iran in response to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s charm offensive at the United Nations in September.

In a much-publicized speech at the U.N.’s General Assembly, Rouhani said Iran has no interest in pursuing nuclear weapons. "Nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction have no place in Iran's security and defense doctrine, and contradict our fundamental religious and ethical convictions," he told the GA.

Iran says its nuclear work is solely peaceful and has recently declared a fatwa against the use of nuclear weapons.

In a first meeting between an American secretary of state and an Iranian foreign minister since May 2007, John Kerry and Mohammad Yavad Zarif discussed reigniting stalled negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program in September.

Analysts say the contours of a deal would imply verifiable limits on Iran’s nuclear activities, in exchange for a lifting of widespread sanctions on Iran.

In a long history of antagonism between Iran and the West, Iran accuses Israel and the West of being behind the assassination of Iranian nuclear scientists and of trying to damage its program in other ways, such as by cyber-attacks.

Al Jazeera and wire services