Monitoring Desk
ISLAMABAD/BRUSSELS: The head of the United Nations (UN) nuclear watchdog has said that he plans to go to Tehran next month for “much-needed” negotiations to resume cooperation over its nuclear activities.
According to the AFP, Rafael Grossi, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told lawmakers in European Parliament (EP), “I might be back in Iran in February 2023, for the much-needed political negotiations, and reestablishment thereof, with Iran,”.
Such the trip would come at a bleak time for European Union-mediated talks aimed at bringing back a 2015 agreement that was struck to curb Iran’s atomic activities in return for a lifting of global sanctions.
That the accord, known as a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), is moribund after the United States (US) under Donald withdrew in 2018, and Iran progressively rolled back it is compliance.
United Nations nuclear chief’s stance
Rafael noted the “big, big impasse” on the JCPOA and also said that Iran’s own pullback from it including disconnecting 27 IAEA cameras monitoring its declared nuclear sites means the IAEA was no longer effectively monitoring Iran’s nuclear activities.
He said that “I have been blind on that aspect for the previous year,”.
Rafael said that he hopes to “be making some progress” on restoring Tehran’s cooperation with his agency during his planned visit.
Speaking about Iran’s recent nuclear activities, including enriching uranium well past JCPOA-mandated limits towards the level needed for nuclear arms, Rafael Grossi said: “That trajectory is certainly not a good one.”
He said that failing to explain to the IAEA radioactive traces found in locations that were not declared as nuclear sites, Tehran growing stock of enriched uranium is of concern.
