Iran runs the risk of attacks if inspectors ae not allowed, nuclear watchdog says

VIENNA: Iranian nuclear sites face a higher probability of renewed military attack unless international inspectors are allowed to resume their work, the head of the United Nations atomic watchdog said, while suggesting a preliminary agreement could be getting closer.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) convened on Monday in Vienna to discuss the ongoing crisis over how to monitor Iran’s atomic activities.

Inspectors have lost track of the Islamic Republic’s inventory of near-bomb grade uranium in the wake of June’s Israeli and US attacks, which destroyed much of the country’s surface-level nuclear infrastructure.

“If we are able to resume in earnest our work with Iran and inspections in full start to take place, the possibility of further military action will be diminished,” IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said at a press briefing.

Striking a more positive note, Grossi said he’s hoping for an initial agreement “within the next few days or hours” that would include an Iranian declaration about the state and location of its uranium stockpile.

After that, officials would still need to negotiate IAEA physical access to damaged sites.

Iran’s ban on international nuclear inspections has led to a critical loss of knowledge about the country’s atomic work, the IAEA wrote last week.

While satellite images show the Israel/US air strikes curtailed much of Iran’s above-ground nuclear activity, they rolled back decades of access by UN inspectors to Tehran’s vast atomic complex. It’s the first time since Iran began enriching uranium in 2006 that the IAEA hasn’t been able to account for gram-level changes to its stockpile. Monitors were last able to confirm the state and location of Iran’s near-bomb-grade uranium a few days before the June 13 attacks began.

“The difficulties lie in the fact that we need to perform a number of inspections...we have to go to places that were destroyed partially or totally where conditions for physical access could be challenging,” Grossi said. “It’s not a straightforward discussion.”

Iran’s Foreign Ministry said earlier on Monday that talks with IAEA officials were moving in the right direction.

“We haven’t yet reached a conclusion in the talks with IAEA, but the course of the discussions has been positive,” spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei told reporters. “We are waiting for final talks to take place and for the final text of the agreement between Iran and the IAEA regarding interaction under the new circumstances to be finalized.”