Iran is continuing its controversial nuclear program despite repeated calls from the international community to halt the uranium enrichment, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said Thursday.

The United Nations Security Council demanded Tehran to pull the plug on the program and end all controversies surrounding it, but according to the latest report released by the IAEA, nuclear facilities continue to be operational in the Middle Eastern country.

The report presented Thursday also revealed that Iran began cooperating with the agency and pledged to elucidate any mysteries surrounding the nuclear program. Iranian officials and IAEA envoys made a “significant step forward” during their talks and established a plan that would sort out all technical aspects.

The Vienna-based agency said during the first round of discussions Iran gave a clear answer to the questions regarding past experiments and said IAEA inspectors will have access to all nuclear facilities.

“Taking all available information into account, the agency has concluded that Iran's statements concerning these experiments are consistent with the agency's findings with respect to the dates and quantities and types of material involved in the experiments,” IAEA’s report said.

Future talks will be essential in settling the dispute and clearing the path for political discussions that would brush off any doubt hanging over Iran’s goals, the IAEA said.

“If Iran finally addresses the long outstanding verification issues, the agency should be in a position to reconstruct the history of Iran's nuclear programme,” the report read.

Officials from the UN nuclear watchdog stressed that talks between the two sides are not related to potential sanctions dictated by the Security Council and expressed their hopes that all remaining aspects will be cleared by the end of 2007.

Iran has been frequently accused of building nuclear weapons under the umbrella of its uranium enrichment program, Tehran underlining the development is only used in the energetic sector and has no relation with its military.

After being heavily criticized and even diplomatically isolated by some nations, Iran continued to build Zippe centrifuges for uranium enrichment. The IAEA said several cascades are functional in Iran and the construction of a plutonium-producing reactor has been started.

If the number of operating facilities are known, the status of the process and level of enrichment remains in the mist until further inspections.