Aletho News

Iran and IAEA relations on tenterhooks

Press TV – June 7, 2022 

The Vienna based International Atomic Energy Agency, the IAEA, is supposed to monitor compliance with the 1968 nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty, NPT, which has been described as the centerpiece of global efforts to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, promote cooperation in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy and to achieve the ultimate goal of global nuclear disarmament.

The IAEA is supposed to engage upon technical, unbiased and professional cooperation with NPT signatories and to be free of politics or political considerations.

The IAEA has had a high profile role regarding Iran’s nuclear energy programme. In 2015, when Iran and the P 5+ 1 struck a deal known as a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. The IAEA was subsequently tasked with monitoring Iran’s compliance with the terms of the agreement.

In many of its reports over the years, the agency has said that it has found no evidence of any diversion in Iran’s nuclear programme.

As the fate of the faltering 2015 deal remains increasingly unclear, the technical role and supposed independence of the atomic watchdog are being tested.

In a recent report, the IAEA said Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium had grown to more than 80 times the limit allowed in the 2015 agreement.

The agency also said Iran has failed to answer its remaining questions.

Tehran described the latest IAEA statements as one sided pointing out that it fails to reflect Iran’s extensive cooperation with the agency.

“The International Atomic Energy Agency seems to be succumbing to the same sort of takeover that the United States and the Anglo Zionist Empire has been doing to so many other international organizations such as, for example, in athletics, for example, in economics with the World Economic Forum, for example, all these organizations; they seem to want to control them.” – Tony Gosling, Investigative Journalist

Meanwhile, reports say Western countries lobbied by Israel are planning to push the International Atomic Energy Agency to criticize Iran at its upcoming meeting of the Board of Governors.

In March Rafael Mariano Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, visited Iran. The IAEA and Iran announced at the end of the visit that they had agreed on an approach for resolving remaining bilateral issues.

The visit came as representatives from Iran and the P 4+1 were trying to find a way to move forward in their negotiations which were aimed at reviving the 2015 deal. The talks are currently stalled with Iran saying the United States is failing to make necessary political decisions.

At this point, any stance by the IAEA could have an important effect on the stalled talks. This week Iran’s top diplomat said the agreement between Tehran and the agency in March was mutually satisfactory. He warned that political interference in the technical affairs of the agency is totally unconstructive.

The comments by Amir-Abdollahian came ahead of a meeting of the IAEA Board of Governors scheduled for June the sixth. With days left to the meeting the IAEA chief has arrived in Israel as Tel Aviv released documents alleging Iran spied on the IAEA.

Iran says Israel, which has refused to join the NPT and is believed to possess hundreds of nuclear warheads, hates the JCPOA and wants to derail the effort to revive it.

The problem with much of what the International Atomic Energy Agency has been doing is that it is trying to find excuses to, I suppose, make out that the Iranian nuclear programme is a military programme.

One of the problems with the IAEA is they’re not looking anywhere near as closely at the Israelis, who do have nuclear weapons.

“They tried to keep it secret, but Mordechai Vanunu blew the whistle in the Sunday Times here in Britain back in the 1980s and did a massive jail term for his, when he was kidnapped actually, for his trouble, that they do have many nuclear weapons, probably something like 200 …” – Tony Gosling, Investigative Journalist

Reports say the United States and its Western allies, pushed by Israel, plan to pile pressure on Iran at the upcoming IAEA meeting.

Tehran has warned that it would respond firmly and appropriately to any such move, because Iran has been cooperating based on the agreement reached in March.

The fate of months of negotiations between Iran and the P 4+1 seems to be at stake as a meeting of the IAEA Board of Governors draws close.

One wonders who would benefit from a possible collapse of the talks.

June 7, 2022 - Posted by aletho | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Wars for Israel | IAEA, Iran, Israel, Middle East, Sanctions against Iran, Zionism