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Inspectors of the UN nuclear watchdog IAEA visited Iranian nuclear sites last week, Iran's foreign ministry spokesperson said Monday, according to state media, a week after the IAEA urged Iran to "seriously improve" co-operation.The IAEA has carried out about a dozen inspections in Iran since hostilities with Israel in June, but last week highlighted it had not been given access to nuclear facilities such as Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan, which were bombed by the United States."As long as we are a member of the NPT (Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons), we will abide by our commitments, and just last week, IAEA inspectors visited several nuclear facilities, including the Tehran Research Reactor," Esmaeil Baghaei said, without naming the others.The International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Grossi said last week that Iran must "seriously improve" co-operation with the United Nations inspectors to avoid heightening tensions with the West.Iranian officials have blamed the IAEA for providing a justification for Israel's bombing in a 12-day war in June, which began the day after the IAEA board voted to declare Iran in violation of obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.Baghaei's comments Monday were in response to Grossi saying last week that Iran "cannot say 'I remain within the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons treaty’, and then not comply with obligations".

The Ministry of Municipality is cracking down on partitioning of villas and seek to mitigate damages by carrying out checks, an official said. “The primary objective of the field inspections is to combat the phenomenon of partitioning, to limit it and to mitigate the damages,” Doha Municipality's Control Department assistant director Mohamed Sultan al-Shahwani told Qatar TV in a recent interview. “We seek to eliminate the phenomenon of partitioning villas, adhere to municipal requirements and eliminate the phenomenon of workers living among families,” he said. The official explained that before the inspection campaign departs, the selected area for the campaign is surveyed and the violating properties are identified. “The campaign then sets out to take action regarding the violations and issue reports,” he said. Ibrahim Abdullah al-Harmi, director of the Technical Affairs Department at Doha Municipality, during the interview, said that the campaign's primary objective is to preserve the urban fabric of the area, target areas in violation and protect residents from structural damage resulting from the phenomenon of villa subdivisions. Authorities have so far warned against illegally partitioning residential units citing that any such practice would draw certain fines and action. Partitioning the residential units without permission is illegal and causes danger to the occupants. As per the law, partitioning should be carried out legally while following the rules.