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 The White House said it would not rule out additional steps
against Iran over the test of the medium-range Emad rocket.
The Security Council's Panel of Experts on Iran said in a
confidential report, first reported by Reuters, that the launch
showed the rocket met its requirements for considering that a
missile could deliver a nuclear weapon.
"On the basis of its analysis and findings the Panel concludes that
Emad launch is a violation by Iran of paragraph 9 of Security
Council resolution 1929," the panel said.
Diplomats said the rocket test on Oct. 10 was not technically a
violation of the July nuclear deal between Iran and six world
powers, but the U.N. report could put U.S. President Barack Obama's
administration in an awkward position.
Iran has said any new sanctions would jeopardize the nuclear deal.
But if Washington failed to call for sanctions over the Emad launch,
it would likely be perceived as weakness.
 Diplomats said it was possible for the U.N. sanctions committee to
blacklist additional Iranian individuals or entities, something
Washington and European countries are likely to ask for. But they
said Russia and China, which dislike the sanctions on Iran's missile
program, might block any such moves.
The panel's report was dated last Friday and went to members of the
Security Council's Iran sanctions committee in recent days. The
report came up on Tuesday when the 15-nation council discussed the
Iran sanctions regime.
It said the panel considered ballistic missiles capable of
delivering nuclear weapons to be those that can deliver at least a
500-kg (1,102-pound) payload within a range of at least 300 km (185
miles).
"The Panel assesses that the launch of the Emad has a range of not
less than 1,000 km with a payload of at least 1,000 kg and that Emad
was also a launch 'using ballistic missile technology,'" the report
said.
Iran's U.N. mission did not respond to a request for comment. In
October, Tehran disputed the Western assessment that the missile was
capable of delivering a nuclear warhead.
The panel noted that Iranian rocket launches from 2012 and 2013 also
violated the U.N. ban on ballistic missile tests.
The chair of the Iran sanctions committee, Spanish Ambassador Roman
Oyarzun, told the council the Panel of Experts had concluded the
attempt by Iran to procure titanium alloy bars earlier this year
also violated U.N. nuclear sanctions.
CONGRESSIONAL RESPONSE
Republicans in Congress who disapprove of the Iran nuclear deal were
seizing on the U.N. panel's findings as grounds for additional
congressional sanctions. Even some Democrats supported unilateral
U.S. action on the missile violations.
 Democratic U.S. Senator Chris Coons, a member of the foreign
relations panel who backed the Iran nuclear deal, said it was up to
the Security Council to act, but if it did not, the United States
should, including by imposing direct sanctions on Iranians
responsible for the missile tests.
While ballistic missile tests may violate U.N. Security Council
sanctions, council diplomats note that such launches are not a
violation of the nuclear deal, which is focused on specific nuclear
activities by Iran.
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Iran, which has always rejected sanctions against it as illegal and
unjustified, has repeatedly made clear it has no intention of
complying with the restrictions on its missile program.
Asked about the panel's report, British U.N. Ambassador Matthew
Rycroft told reporters it was "absolutely crucial that the Security
Council upholds its responsibilities and does respond effectively to
what appears to have been a breach."
The expert panel did not mention a second reported missile test that
Iran carried out last month. The panel produced its report after the
United States, Britain, France and Germany in October called on the
U.N. sanctions committee to take action in response to Iran's test
of an Emad missile.
Security Council resolution 1929, which bans ballistic missile
tests, was adopted in 2010 and remains valid until the nuclear deal
is implemented.
Under that deal, most sanctions on Iran will be lifted in exchange
for curbs on its nuclear program. According to a July 20 resolution
endorsing the deal, Iran is still "called upon" to refrain from work
on ballistic missiles designed to deliver nuclear weapons for up to
eight years.
Although the section of the July 20 resolution applying to missiles
is weaker and more limited than the total ban in resolution 1929,
U.S. officials have said they will continue to act as if there were
a de facto total ban on ballistic missile tests by Iran in the years
to come once the nuclear deal is implemented.
The experts' report also noted that ballistic missile launches would
still be covered by the July 20 resolution.
U.S., Iranian and Russian officials have said they expect full
implementation of the Iran deal, including the lifting of sanctions,
to happen early next year once the U.N. nuclear watchdog confirms
Iranian compliance with the agreed restrictions on its atomic work.
Earlier on Tuesday, the U.N. nuclear watchdog's 35-nation board in
Vienna closed its investigation into whether Iran sought atomic
weapons, opting to back the international deal with Tehran rather
than dwell on Iran's past activities, diplomats said.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry welcomed the decision to close
the investigation into whether Iran once had a secret nuclear
weapons program.
(Additional reporting by Patricia Zengerle in Washington, Michelle
Nichols in New York, and Francois Murphy and Shadia Nasrallah in
Vienna; Editing by Alistair Bell and Peter Cooney)
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