JOIN USIran N deal set to move ahead
The implementation of Iran’s nuclear deal is set to move ahead following agreement over the redesign of the Arak heavy water reactor, which is to have its plutonium core removed to prevent spent fuel from being used to produce weapons grade plutonium for a nuclear bomb. Arak’s residue is to be exported and the plant co-nverted into a research facility.
The new document, signed by the foreign ministers of the five permanent UN Security Council members plus Germany, paved the way for speedy progress on the landmark nuclear accord formally adopted on October 18 in exchange for lifting crippling sanctions imposed on Iran.
Over the past month, Tehran began to remove centrifuges – machines that enrich uranium – and related equipment from its Nantaz and Fordo plants. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported on November 19 that 4,530
centrifuges had been mothballed, one-third of the 14,000 in Tehran is required to decommission. Iran is permitted 5,060 centrifuges to fuel power plants and for research and medical uses. Those removed were inactive.
Although Iran's nuclear negotiator Abbas Araqchi predicted the deal would be fully implemented by year's end, some experts claim it could take until mid-January while others say another four and a half months would be needed to dismantle the required number of operational centrifuges, if this is to proceed without damaging the delicate machines. Dismantled centrifuges are being stored under the IAEA supervision.
Among the optimists was Robert Kelley, an IAEA nuclear engineer experienced in centrifuge dismantlement. “By the time you have this down to a routine, it's not more difficult than changing a set of tyres.” “Therefore,” he remarked, “there’s no reason the Iranians cannot continue at the (current) pace.”
A man who did not take orders from Washington while being the IAEA director, Kelley ruled that Iraq had no nuclear weapons ahead of the 2003 US invasion and occupation of that country on the pretext Baghdad had banned nuclear, chemical and biological weapons. None was found by the US after the disastrous war.
Iran has, so far, done nothing to reduce to 300 kg its stockpile of 16,141 kg of uranium enriched to 3.4 per cent reactor grade. Uranium enriched to 20 per cent has been converted to powder. Tehran is expected to export excess.
The IAEA has commenced preparations for boosting the monitoring and verification pro-visions at Iran's uranium mines, mills and centrifuge manufacturing areas as well as its nuclear plants. The IAEA is to be granted expanded access to all sites and Iran is to notify the agency of intentions to construct new nuclear facilities.
The report noted that the IAEA has completed its investigation into Iran's research on military applications of nuclear technology, said to have been terminated in 2003. The IAEA is to issue an assessment on past work on December 15.
Dismantling centrifuges
Therefore, one month after the seven parties to the deal - Iran, the US, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany - progress is being made. However, it has not been without hitches. The dismantling of centrifuges paused around November 10 after hard line Iranian lawmakers complained the process was too hurried and should not have begun until after the mid-December IAEA report is issued.
This demand was in line with the ruling of the country's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who remains deeply suspicious of Western powers which have repeatedly co-opted experts to launch accusations of illegal Iranian activity.
Currently working with the Stockholm-based International Peace Research Institute, Kelley warned that while making its assessment of Iran's past programme, the IAEA has had to contend with the US and Israeli allegations without proof that Iran continued its weapons programme beyond 2003 by acquiring high explosives used to launch nuclear reactions in bombs and detonators that set them off. Presumably, the US dropped such accusations once the nuclear accord was reached back in July.
Once Iran has met its commitments, whether in mid-January or a few weeks later, the US, in particular, and other powers must begin ending sanctions on oil and banking, permitting Iran to export oil and receive payments. If this begins early in 2016, President Hassan Rouhani’s moderate camp will be strengthened vis a vis hard liners, ahead of the parliamentary elections on February 26.
The Islamic State (IS) attacks on Paris, Beirut, a Russian airliner, and Ankara could also expedite the easing of sanctions because of the war in Syria and Iraq. The IS cannot be contained and eventually defeated without Iran's allies which provide the boots-on-the-ground no Western or Arab countries are prepared to commit.
These include Lebanon's Hezbollah fighters deployed in Syria and pro-Iran Shia militias fighting the IS in Iraq. Iran has already been welcomed into the magic circle of countries seeking to broker cease-fires in Syria and negotiate a plan for the transition from the current government of Bashar al-Assad to a successor regime, a new constitution, and elections.