U.S.: Iran sanctions draft to start next week

The United States expects the nations confronting Iran’s nuclear ambitions to begin drafting new sanctions next week. Representatives of the five veto-wielding nations on the U.N. Security Council, plus Germany, conferred Thursday morning in a conference call, the U.S. State Department said in a statement. They discussed the most recent report by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog, suggesting that Iran had increased nuclear activities in defiance of a Security Council resolution from December that imposed limited sanctions. “They had a good productive discussion during which they made progress in agreeing on the elements of a resolution,” the statement said, adding that another conference was scheduled for Saturday morning.