The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday revealed that it had obtained evidence indicating that Iran “has kept active and intact its core team of weaponization researchers” as international criticism deepened over what appears to be a deliberate campaign by Tehran to skirt core obligations regarding the disclosure of possible military dimensions (PMDs) of its atomic program:
The Islamic Republic’s attempts to develop a nuclear explosive device date to the late 1980s, when the regime established a Defense Ministry-linked physics research center in Tehran, according to Western intelligence agencies. By the next decade, according to the IAEA, the regime would consolidate its weaponization researchers under an initiative called the “AMAD Plan,” headed by Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, a Ph.D. nuclear engineer and senior member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The AMAD Plan was charged with procuring dual-use technologies, developing nuclear detonators and conducting high-explosive experiments associated with compressing fissile material, according to Western intelligence agencies. The AMAD Plan’s most intense period of activity was in 2002-03, according to the IAEA, when current President Hasan Rouhani headed Iran’s Supreme National Security Council before becoming its chief nuclear negotiator.
Feeling the heat from the MEK’s disclosure of two nuclear facilities in 2002 and the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, the mullahs apparently halted the AMAD Plan’s activities in late 2003. But Mr. Fakhrizadeh and his scientists didn’t stop their weaponization work. As former United Nations weapons inspector David Albright told us, “Fakhrizadeh continued to run the program in the military industry, where you could work on nuclear weapons.” Much of the work, including theoretical explosive modeling, was shifted to Defense Ministry-linked universities, such as Malek Ashtar University of Technology in Tehran.
The Journal contextualized the new revelations as a potential corrective to the “palliative effect” of ongoing talks combined with a recent report by the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog (IAEA) describing halting progress on some PMD-related issues.
The IAEA report received broad coverage as an indicator that Iran had “for the first time addressed concerns about the so-called [PMDs] of its nuclear programme” – specifically in the context of detonation experiments believed to be linked to the development of nuclear warheads – triggering clarifications from analysts and diplomats that PMD concerns range far beyond those tests. Observers have instead treated the issue as a key condition for establishing a robust verification regime.
Various agencies linked to the Iranian military are thought to have their hand in everything from mining to enrichment to full-blown weaponization efforts, and untangling them from Iran’s atomic program has been treated as a prerequisite to establishing the conditions needed to assure the international community that Iran cannot obtain a nuclear weapon.
Washington Institute Managing Director Michael Singh emphasized months ago that “[w]ithout insight into the full extent of Iran’s clandestine nuclear activities, no amount of monitoring and inspection can provide true confidence that Iran lacks a parallel program beyond inspectors’ view.”
The French Foreign Ministry on Tuesday according to Reuters blasted Iran for dragging its feet on genuinely establishing transparency around PMDs:
However, Nadal said Iran’s “cooperation with the IAEA on a possible military dimension (to its nuclear programme) is progressing too slowly despite the agency’s repeated efforts”.
U.S. officials say it is vital for Iran to answer IAEA questions if Washington and the five other powers are to reach a broader nuclear settlement. However, Tehran’s repeated denials of any nuclear bomb aspirations will make it hard for it to admit to any wrongdoing in the past without losing face.
Paris has long held out for strict terms in talks, in which it and Britain, China, Germany, Russia and the United States are contemplating a further easing of economic sanctions if Iran can dispel their concerns.
“Concrete results (in the IAEA-Iran talks) are indispensable before the possible finalisation of a long-term agreement,” Nadal said. “More needs to be done between now and July.”
The wire wrote up the remarks above and below the observation that “Paris has long held out for strict terms in talks.” News emerged last week that the White House was contemplating establishing channels for negotiations with Iran that would freeze out the French.