UNITED NATIONS: Director of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Grossi, on Friday warned that any strike on Iran’s Bushehr nuclear reactor would have serious consequences as it contains thousands of kilograms of nuclear material.
He told the UN Security Council that so far, the IAEA had not yet detected radiation after Israel’s military campaign against Iran, including attacks on nuclear sites.
“Countries of the region have reached out directly to me over the past few hours to express their concerns, and I want to make it absolutely and completely clear — in case of an attack on the Bushehr nuclear power plant, a direct hit would result in a very high release of radioactivity,” Grossi said.
The IAEA Director General warned that even an Israeli strike targeting the power lines supplying electricity to Iran’s Bushehr nuclear facility could have catastrophic consequences. Disabling the plant’s power source, he cautioned, could lead to a potential reactor meltdown.
In a worst-case scenario, Grossi said, mass evacuations and shelter-in-place orders would be required for areas within several hundred kilometers of Bushehr—impacting major population centers across the Gulf Arab states and threatening a key artery of the global economy.
He added that affected populations would need to take iodine to mitigate radiation exposure and could face disruptions in food supplies.
The construction of the Bushehr nuclear plant started in the 1970s, which aimed to establish a civilian nuclear energy programme. Initially developed with the help of German engineers, the project has been maintained and expanded since the 1990s in cooperation with Russia.
Grossi appealed for a diplomatic solution and repeated his willingness to travel to negotiate a deal.
“The IAEA can guarantee through a watertight inspection system that nuclear weapons will not be developed in Iran,” he said.
