The director general of the UN body also said that the IAEA would increase the pace of its visits to the Fordo underground plant.
Is this a timid sign of de-escalation in the sensitive Iranian nuclear issue? Iran has agreed to reconnect surveillance cameras at several nuclear sites, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), back from Tehran, said on Saturday March 4. “We have reached an agreement so that the cameras and surveillance systems can operate again”Rafael Grossi told reporters at Vienna airport.
This should be set up “very soon”after a technical meeting, he said, while the statement issued jointly with the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization (AEIO) remains vague.
In addition, the number of visits by the UN body to the Fordo underground plant, where uranium particles enriched to a level of 83.7% close to the threshold of the atomic bomb were recently detected, will be increased. by 50%. Rafael Grossi was returning from a two-day visit to Tehran, where he had talks at the highest level, notably meeting Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi.
The objective of “reviving the agreement” of 2015 on the Iranian nuclear
The Islamic Republic had severely limited inspections and disconnected surveillance cameras last year, plunging the IAEA into the dark, in a context of deteriorating relations between Iran and Western powers. “We have stopped the bleeding of information” available to the IAEA, welcomed Rafael Grossi.
In recent months, for lack of sufficient monitoring, the Agency had said that it was no longer able to guarantee the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear program. “It’s very, very important”, “especially with a view to reviving the agreement” of 2015 which limited Iran’s atomic activities in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions. Negotiations on this subject have been at a standstill since the summer of 2022. They began in April 2021 in Vienna between Tehran and the States Parties (China, Russia, United Kingdom, France and Germany), with the indirect participation of the States United, but they have been blocked since August 2022.
Since 2018, the Islamic Republic has gradually freed itself from its commitments. Its total stock of enriched uranium thus amounted to 3.760 kg on February 12 (against 3.673 kg in October), more than 18 times the limit authorized by the JCPOA, according to calculations by the IAEA.