"They adopted it by consensus," a diplomat told AFP of the setting up of an "advisory committee on safeguards and verification."

US ambassador Jackie Sanders told reporters: "The proliferation challenges of today, including noncompliance by North Korea and Iran and the revelation of nuclear (international smuggling) procurement networks, call for more evolution. The new committee should play a key role in helping us meet these challenges."

The White House welcomed the creation of the special committee, saying it would "aid efforts to counter the proliferation of nuclear weapons and will strengthen the IAEAs ability to monitor and enforce compliance with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and related agreements."

The United States charges that Iran is using a civilian nuclear program, which the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been investigating for over two years, to hide the development of nuclear weapons.

Bush had called in a landmark speech in February 2004 for the IAEA, which verifies compliance with the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, to be strengthened.

Bush had wanted only "governments in good standing with the IAEA" and not "under investigation for proliferation violations" such as Iran to be able to serve on the committee but had to yield on this as non-aligned states feared the committee would be a US vehicle to control the IAEA's verification tasks, diplomats said.

"The original US proposal has been completely overhauled," a non-aligned diplomat told AFP.

The diplomat said the committee will be an advisory rather than a standing body, with a limited two-year mandate and open to all members of the IAEA's 35-nation board of governors, on which Iran served last year in a regular rotation.

"It doesn't in any way undermine the board," the diplomat said.

The diplomat said the "Americans moved tremendously to meet the preoccupations of the memberships of the board."

The confidential US proposal, a copy of which was obtained by AFP, calls on the IAEA board "to set up a committee on safeguards and verification to consider ways and means to strengthen the safeguards system and to report thereon, with recommendations to the board of governors."

IAEA chief ElBaradei had told the board Tuesday that such a committee had been set up in 1996 "in the aftermath of the failure of the safeguards system in the early 1990's to detect Iraq's clandestine nuclear weapon program."

The United States has moved to defuse tensions with the IAEA, which Washington charges is soft on Iran, since Condoleezza Rice took office as US Secretary of State, dropping opposition to ElBaradei serving a third four-year term as IAEA chief.

The board re-elected ElBaradei on Monday.

The board was wrapping up Friday the week-long meeting at its headquarters in Vienna that had sharply criticized Iran for still dragging its feet in helping the IAEA investigation, which has already discovered almost two decades of hidden Iranian nuclear activity.

IAEA deputy director for safeguards Pierre Goldschmidt told the board Thursday that the IAEA has now discovered that Iran had failed to report it was carrying out experiments on plutonium, a potential atom bomb material, as late as 1998.

ElBaradei backed the US idea for a special verifications oversight committee.

IAEA officials denied hints by some diplomats that this was part of a deal with the United States in return for his continuing in office. They said ElBaradei, who had originally opposed the idea, was accepting what was a re-worked proposal for an oversight committee.

ElBaradei had told the IAEA board on Tuesday that "recent revelations, such as the discovery of additional undeclared nuclear programs, aided by covert nuclear supply networks and the risks associated with nuclear terrorism, have confronted the agency's verification system and the non-proliferation regime in general with unprecedented challenges."

"A new committee would usefully explore how the safeguards system could be further strengthened," ElBaradei said.

All rights reserved. � 2005 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.

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