Caracas (Venezuela), September 22: U.S. sanctions against Venezuela are hampering its technical cooperation program with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the Venezuelan government said on Tuesday.
Tania Masea, deputy minister of New Sources and Rational Use of Electric Energy, voiced the complaint at the 65th IAEA General Conference via teleconference.
"Illegal" U.S. sanctions imposed on the South American country, she said, have placed "limitations on the acquisition, installation and maintenance of equipment or supplies within the technical cooperation program" with the international organization.
IAEA technical assistance "is essential to contributing to development and prosperity," she added, and should not be subject to "restrictions" of any kind.
"No country should interfere in the normal functioning of any other countries' technical cooperation program," Masea said.
Venezuela has registered complaints with different international bodies about "the imposition of the illegal, illegitimate and immoral unilateral coercive measures by a country that takes advantage of its economic power to impose measures on other countries that violate the United Nations Charter," said Masea.
In doing so, Venezuela is defending the "inalienable right of developing countries to strengthen their technological knowledge and platform to be able to use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes," she said.
Source: Xinhua