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On Friday, Iran’s ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency rejected the agency’s director’s proposal that the Iranian nuclear deal be revived after a new US administration came to power with a new deal.
“Presenting any assessment on how to implement the obligations is beyond the agency’s mandate and should be avoided,” Ambassador Kazem Gharibabadi wrote on Twitter.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, architect of the nuclear deal with the six major powers, has repeatedly said that the measures taken by Tehran could be reversed if the United States lifted sanctions and fully respected the agreement.
In an interview with Reuters on Thursday, Rafael Grossi, director of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said there are so many violations by Tehran that it is impossible to return to what it was once the president-elect of the United States, Joe Biden, take office next month.
Biden had said the United States would rejoin the deal “if Iran strictly again complied” with the terms of the deal.
Accusations against Iran
Iran is accused of violating many of the agreement’s restrictions on its nuclear activities, in response to the withdrawal of US President Donald Trump and his re-imposition of US sanctions on Tehran that were lifted under the agreement. Tehran says it can backtrack quickly if US sanctions are lifted.
But Grossi said the violations are too much to reverse quickly. “I can’t imagine them just saying that we will go back to the starting point, because the starting point no longer exists,” he told Reuters at the headquarters of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
“It is clear that we will necessarily need a protocol, agreement, understanding or attached document that clearly defines what we will do,” he said.
According to media reports, Iran’s enriched uranium stocks currently amount to more than 2.4 tons, which is 12 times more than the limit allowed in the agreement, but is much less than its arsenal before the agreement, which it was 8 tons.
Iran began enriching uranium to a purity level of 4.5%, which exceeds the agreement’s limit of 3.67%, but is also much less than the 20% it reached before the agreement was signed.
Iran is conducting enrichment operations at sites that are not allowed by the agreement, such as the Fordo site at the bottom of the mountain, and recently began enriching advanced centrifuges at the Natanz underground reactor, and the agreement says only first-generation centrifuges are allowed there.
Support the agreement
Yesterday, the Secretary General of the United Nations, António Guterres, renewed his support for the nuclear agreement between Iran and the “5 + 1” group signed in 2015, saying it was “a great diplomatic achievement”.
This occurred at a press conference by Stefan Dujarric, Guterres spokesman, via closed circuit television with journalists at the headquarters of the international organization in New York, and was responding to questions from journalists about Guterres’ position on the statements of Rafael Grossi.
“What I can say is that the Secretary General has always called on all parties to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (the nuclear deal) to support the deal,” Dujarric said.
He added that Guterres “has always viewed the JCPOA as an important diplomatic achievement that must be constantly supported.”
In May 2018, Washington withdrew from the 2015 agreement signed between Iran and the “5 + 1” group, which includes Russia, Britain, China, the United States, France and Germany, and imposed economic sanctions on Tehran.
On Wednesday, the signatories of the nuclear deal with Iran met in an attempt to calm the atmosphere, awaiting the inauguration of the new US administration.
This meeting was held hypothetically due to the Covid-19 pandemic and lasted around two hours and issued a short statement.
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