US, Britain, Canada Responsible for N. Disarmament Talks Failure: Iranian Diplomat

Writing on his Instagram page, Baeidinejad, who headed the Iranian delegation and spoke on behalf of a group of more than 100 countries in the four-week talks, expounded on the reasons behind the failure of the NPT review conference.

The US on Friday blocked a global document by the conference aimed at ridding the world of nuclear weapons.

Baeidinejad said during the talks on Friday, Iran, on behalf of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), expressed "deep despair and sadness over the statements by the US, Britain and Canada, which blocked the approval of the final document and caused the failure of the conference."

He added that "Unfortunately, the three countries accepted the heavy costs of rejecting the document to serve the interests of a non-member regime (Israel) that has endangered peace and security in (the Middle East) region and the entire world by its military nuclear capacity."

The now-failed final document of the landmark treaty review conference had called on the UN secretary-general to convene the Middle East conference no later than March 2016, regardless of whether Israel and its neighbors agree on an agenda.

Egypt later said it was extremely disappointed and warned the three countries, "This will have consequences in front of the Arab world and public opinion."

Since adopting a final document requires consensus, the rejection by the United States, backed by Britain and Canada, means the entire blueprint for global nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation for the next five years has been blocked after four weeks of negotiations. The next treaty review conference is in 2020.

Israel is believed to possess anywhere from 75 to as many as 400 nuclear weapons, including thermonuclear weapons in the megaton range. Israel has never confirmed or denied being in possession of the arms in line with its policy of "nuclear ambiguity".