[The temporary agreement should keep Tehran from censure for
noncompliance by the nuclear agency, a move that could have derailed
already suspended nuclear talks.] [[link removed]]

IRAN AND I.A.E.A. REACH LAST-MINUTE DEAL ON NUCLEAR MONITORING  
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Steven Erlanger
September 12, 2021
New York Times
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_ The temporary agreement should keep Tehran from censure for
noncompliance by the nuclear agency, a move that could have derailed
already suspended nuclear talks. _

Rafael M. Grossi, director general of the I.A.E.A., third from left,
bumped fists with Mohammad Eslami, head of the Atomic Energy
Organization of Iran, in Tehran on Sunday, Wana News Agency, via
Reuters

 

BRUSSELS — In a last-minute deal before Iran was likely to be
censured for violating its agreements with the International Atomic
Energy Agency, the new government in Tehran agreed on Sunday to let
the organization reset monitoring devices that help measure the
progress of the country’s nuclear program.

That deal has been considered a minimal requirement for a resumption
of talks in Vienna on trying to restore compliance with the 2015 Iran
nuclear deal
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which President Donald J. Trump abandoned in 2018
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President Biden wants to rejoin the deal, but talks, which have not
resumed since June, have been hampered by the desire of both Iran and
the United States to alter or enhance it. The nuclear deal essentially
put tough limits on Iran’s ability to enrich uranium in return for
the lifting of punishing economic sanctions.

Mr. Trump restored most of those sanctions and added to them
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Iran responded by breaking the enrichment limits
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is now much closer to having enough highly enriched uranium to create
a nuclear weapon — which Tehran still insists it has no intention of
doing.

The director general of the nuclear agency, Rafael M. Grossi, made a
quick visit to Iran this weekend and worked out at least a temporary
arrangement with Mohammad Eslami, the chief of the country’s Atomic
Energy Organization.

In a joint statement
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on Sunday, they agreed that I.A.E.A. inspectors could service the
monitoring equipment, which includes cameras, and replace their
storage cards with new ones. But as agreed in a similar emergency deal
last February, the contents of the storage cards are kept under seal
and will be released to the agency only when and if Iran and the
United States agree on a revival of the 2015 deal, known as the Joint
Comprehensive Plan of Action
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The I.A.E.A., charged with monitoring Iran’s nuclear program, has
been increasingly critical of Iran’s failure to cooperate with the
agency and of its longstanding refusal to provide explanations for the
presence of traces of radioactive material at several sites or about
where that material may be now. The agency’s frustration was
detailed in two confidential quarterly reports issued to the board
last week.

The agency’s board meets on Monday, and European members, along with
the United States, had been threatening to censure Iran for its
noncompliance. Iran and its new hard-line government
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by President Ebrahim Raisi threatened to abandon the nuclear arms
talks in Vienna if a censure resolution was passed.

China and Russia, also signatories to the 2015 nuclear deal, along
with Britain, France, Germany and the United States, have argued for
patience with the new Iranian government and against the censure. That
led to the drama of the latest Grossi visit, which Russia negotiated
with Iran.

But as time goes by and Iran moves closer to having enough material
for a bomb — estimated on Friday to be only a month or so away by
David Albright, a nuclear expert with the Institute for Science and
International Security, a research institution in Washington — the
difficulty of reviving the 2015 deal grows sharper.

That deal was intended to keep Iran at least 12 months away from
having enough material for a bomb. And critics say that Iran’s
growing knowledge of how to make and service modern centrifuges and
uranium metal — banned under the 2015 deal — cannot be unlearned,
let alone its separate advances in missile technology.

European and American officials, such as Secretary of State Antony J.
Blinken and Robert Malley, the U.S. special envoy for Iran who is
handling the talks, have said that the time period for reviving the
nuclear deal is “not open-ended.” And Mr. Raisi has yet to commit
to a date to return to the Vienna talks. Countries in the region,
including Saudi Arabia and Israel, have been expressing considerable
concern about Iran’s expanding nuclear program.

Mr. Grossi’s trip may have momentarily resolved some of the
complaints in one of the I.A.E.A.’s confidential reports, about lack
of access to monitoring equipment. The agency also said that it did
have access on Sept. 4 to a centrifuge assembly site that was damaged
by sabotage, which Iran has blamed on Israel. But one of four cameras
had been destroyed, its recording material missing, and another
damaged. It is not clear whether the recordings in the other cameras
will be recoverable.

But questions in the second report, about radioactive traces found at
four Iranian sites and summarized as “undeclared nuclear material
and activities,” have not been answered by Iran in an inquiry that
has been open since 2018.

“The lack of progress in clarifying the agency’s questions
concerning the correctness and completeness of Iran’s safeguards
declarations seriously affects the ability of the agency to provide
assurance of the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear program,” the
report
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In Tehran on Sunday, Mr. Grossi said, “I am glad to say that today
we were able to have a very constructive result, which has to do with
the continuity of the operation of the agency’s equipment here.”
He said that the arrangement was “indispensable for us to provide
the necessary guarantee and information to the I.A.E.A. and to the
world that everything is in order.”

Mr. Eslami said that Mr. Grossi would return to Iran soon for further
talks. He did not say whether Iran would eventually hand over copies
of the older recordings, which Tehran had previously threatened to
destroy.

“The memory cards are sealed and kept in Iran according to the
routine,” Mr. Eslami said. “New memory cards will be installed in
cameras. That is a routine and natural trend in the agency’s
monitoring system.”

_STEVEN ERLANGER is the chief diplomatic correspondent in Europe,
based in Brussels. He previously reported from London, Paris,
Jerusalem, Berlin, Prague, Moscow and Bangkok. @StevenErlanger
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