The IAEA Voices ‘Serious Concern’ Over Blocked Access to Certain Iranian Sites
Two new reports from the UN agency expresse concern about Iran’s blocking access to certain sites and confirm the country’s increased uranium enrichment activities
by Stephanie Liechtenstein. Read more on PassBlue.
VIENNA — The International Atomic Energy Agency issued an alarming report on June 5, voicing “serious concern” over Iran’s refusal to allow the agency’s inspectors to investigate two sites where the country is suspected of having conducted undeclared nuclear activities in the past.
The report is unrelated to the agency’s quarterly updates on Iran’s obligations under the 2015 nuclear deal with the world’s major powers — Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States (which left the deal in 2018). Instead, the new report provides information on Iran’ s noncompliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty ( NPT), including its Safeguards Agreement and Additional Protocol.
The confidential report, which was sent to IAEA member states on June 5 and seen by PassBlue, details suspected nuclear material and activities at three sites in Iran, where the material is thought to have been situated. The report is the second of its kind; the first was published in March 2020.
At one site, the UN agency says in its report that between 2002 and 2003 there was a “possible presence . . . of natural uranium in the form of a metal disc.” The agency now wants to know where this material is located. It also says “this location underwent extensive sanitization,” making it pointless for the agency to access the site.
The IAEA also wants more information from Iran on a second site, where there could have been “possible use or storage of nuclear material.” The site “may have been used for the processing and conversion of uranium ore . . . in 2003,” the report details.
Furthermore, the agency wants answers from Iran on a third site, where nuclear material was possibly used and stored and “conventional explosive testing may have taken place in 2003.” According to the report, parts of that site appeared to have been sanitized in 2019.
