November 30, 2007 (LPAC)--During his Nov. 28-29 visit to Argentina, Mohamed ElBaradei, director of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), announced that the prestigious Balseiro Center would be designated as a regional IAEA educational facility for the training of nuclear scientists and engineers.

Prominent Argentine physicist Jose Antonio Balseiro founded the Center in 1955 and designed its impressive curriculum. Its summer school attracted scientists from all over Ibero-America for several years, and today it is widely respected as one of the continent's premier institutions for scientific education. It functions as part of the Bariloche Atomic Center and the National Atomic Energy Commission (IAEA), and is connected as well to the highly-regarded University of Cuyo.

ElBaradei traveled to Argentina from Chile where he received an award from the Bachelet government, and told his guests there that "without nuclear energy there can be no development." In Buenos Aires, he met personally with President Nestor Kirchner and toured the country's several nuclear facilities and educational institutions.

According to the daily Clarin, he also briefed the President on the contents of the report he had just delivered to the IAEA's board on Iran's nuclear program, in which he argued there was little evidence to argue that Iran is close to developing a nuclear weapons capability. In interviews with the Argentine media, he also warned, that should force be used against Iran, this would drive that country to develop nuclear weapons more quickly. Diplomacy, not military might, is the only reasonable way to approach Iran, he said.