March 4, 2023
Tehran, Iran – The head
of the global nuclear watchdog is holding talks in Tehran in an effort to reach
an understanding with Iran on nuclear safeguard issues that could also affect
the country’s 2015 nuclear deal, which collapsed in 2018.
Rafael Grossi, the
director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), landed in
the Iranian capital on Friday evening and met with Mohammad Eslami, the head of
the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI).
The two continued their
talks on Saturday and also held a joint press conference.
Grossi then met with
foreign minister Hossein Amirabdollahian.
Grossi is expected to
hold another press conference when he returns to Vienna later on Saturday.
The trip, the first in
months, comes days ahead of the IAEA’s next Board of Governors meeting on
Monday, where there is a chance the United States and its European allies could
pursue another resolution to censure Iran.
Amid reports that it
has opposed a European push for another resolution, Washington has said it will
wait for the results of Grossi’s trips to decide its next move.
Eslami told reporters
on Saturday that Tehran will announce a response if the Western parties to the
nuclear deal decide to move ahead with what would be their third resolution in
the past year.
Iran boosted its
nuclear enrichment efforts and curbed IAEA monitoring in response to the
previous two resolutions.
The agency confirmed
last week that traces of uranium enriched to the near-weapons grade level of 84
percent have been found in Iran and that it will need to discuss this further
with Tehran.
Iranian officials have
said the fact that “particles” of higher-enriched materials have been found
does not mean it is actively enriching beyond its declared 60 percent level,
something Eslami reiterated on Saturday.
“We are committed to
our safeguards agreement with the agency and we won’t allow any elements or
actions to undermine this cooperation, so our work will continue and we won’t
allow any non-compliance to cause a lack of trust,” Eslami said during the
press conference.
Grossi said work on
several issues, including unexplained materials found several years ago in
three Iranian sites, is continuing and results can only be confirmed at the end
of the talks.
“What we do here and
the agreement we are trying to reach could help with restoring the JCPOA,” he
said, referencing the official name of the nuclear accord, the Joint
Comprehensive Plan of Action.
The nuclear deal was
signed in 2015, but Washington unilaterally withdrew from it in 2018 and
imposed harsh sanctions on Iran, which gradually abandoned its limits,
including a 3.67 percent cap on enrichment.
Efforts to restore or
renegotiate the deal have stalled in the past year.
Tehran maintains that
its nuclear programme is strictly peaceful and it does not seek a nuclear
weapon.
UN nuclear head meets with Iranians amid enrichment concerns
March
4, 2023
The
head of the UN nuclear watchdog was meeting with officials in Iran on Saturday,
days after it was revealed that the country had enriched particles of uranium
to near weapons-grade, raising new alarm over its long-disputed nuclear
program.
Rafael
Mariano Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, declined to
comment on his discussions during a press conference with the head of Iran’s
nuclear program, saying the delegation’s work was still ongoing.
“It’s
an atmosphere of work, of honesty and cooperation,” Grossi said. He later met
with Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi and was expected to speak with reporters
upon his return to Vienna.
Earlier
this week, the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency reported that
uranium particles enriched up to 83.7% – just short of weapons-grade – were
found in Iran’s underground Fordo nuclear site.
The
confidential quarterly report by the IAEA, which was distributed to member
states on Tuesday, came as tensions were already high amid months of
anti-government protests in Iran and Western anger at its export of attack
drones to Russian forces fighting in Ukraine.
The
IAEA report says that inspectors in January found that two cascades of IR-6
centrifuges at Iran’s Fordo facility had been configured in a way
“substantially different” to what had been previously declared. The IAEA took
samples the following day, which showed particles with up to 83.7% purity, the
report said.
The
IAEA report only spoke about “particles,” suggesting that Iran isn’t building a
stockpile of uranium enriched above 60% – the level it has been enriching at
for some time. However, the agency also said in its report that it would
“further increase the frequency and intensity of agency verification
activities” at Fordo after the discovery.
Iran
has sought to portray any detection of highly enriched uranium particles as a
momentary side effect of trying to reach a finished product of 60% purity.
However, experts say such a great variance in the purity even at the atomic
level would appear suspicious to inspectors.
The
chief of Iran’s nuclear program, Mohammad Eslami, acknowledged the findings of
the IAEA report at the press conference with Grossi but said it did not amount
to 84% enrichment. He said the “ambiguity” of the findings had been resolved.
Nonproliferation
experts say Tehran has no civilian use for uranium enriched to even 60%. A
stockpile of material enriched to 90%, the level needed for weapons, could be
quickly used to produce an atomic bomb if Iran chooses.
Iran’s
2015 nuclear deal with world powers limited Tehran’s uranium stockpile and
capped enrichment at 3.67% – enough to fuel a nuclear power plant.
The
US unilaterally withdrew from the accord in 2018, reimposing crushing sanctions
on Iran, which then began openly breaching the deal’s restrictions. Efforts by
the Biden administration, European countries and Iran to negotiate a return to
the deal reached an impasse last summer.
Iran
long has denied ever seeking nuclear weapons and maintains its program is
peaceful, but is widely believed to have had a nuclear weapons program until
2003.
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