Nuclear-arms probe in Iran at standstill, two say

Thursday, September 4, 2014

VIENNA -- A United Nations probe of allegations that Iran worked on atomic arms has stalled, diplomats said, leaving investigators not much further than where they started a decade ago and dampening U.S. hopes of reaching an overarching nuclear deal with Tehran by a November deadline.

Expectations were high just two weeks ago, when chief U.N. nuclear inspector Yukiya Amano emerged from talks in Tehran with Iranian President Hasan Rouhani saying Iran had given "a firm commitment" to cooperation and suggesting that years of deadlock had been broken.

But two diplomats said the International Atomic Energy Agency will issue a confidential report this week saying Iran hasn't provided information to substantially advance the probe, a finding that could affect talks between Iran and six major powers.

The diplomats spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to discuss the confidential talks. Atomic agency spokesman Gill Tudor said Wednesday that the agency would have no comment. Iran said Reza Najafi, the chief delegate to the agency, was in Tehran and nobody else could speak to reporters about the probe.

The sides face a Nov. 24 deadline -- already delayed from July 31 -- to agree on a deal meant to limit Iran's nuclear capacities in exchange for sanctions relief. The atomic agency probe is formally separate from the U.S.-led talks, but Washington said a successful investigation by the agency must be part of any final deal.

A determination that the probe has stalled would strengthen those in the U.S. Congress who were skeptical of predictions that Rouhani's assumption of the presidency last year marked a turn away from confrontation on the nuclear issue.

Iran and the atomic agency agreed in February to a new start to the probe after a decade of deadlock, marked by Tehran's insistence that 1,000 pages of allegations of nuclear activity were based on falsified intelligence from the United States and Israel.

Since then, the U.N. agency has sought information on three issues: purported experiments with detonators that can be used to set off a nuclear explosion, separate work on high-explosive charges also used in nuclear blasts, and purported studies on calculating nuclear explosive yields.

Iran denies wanting -- or ever working on -- nuclear arms.

The diplomats said that as of Wednesday morning Iran had provided information only on the detonators, insisting that they were used for oil exploration. While such applications are possible, the agency said it has information suggesting the detonators were being tested for nuclear weapons use.

No information has been given on the other two issues, the diplomats said, although two senior agency experts pressed Iranian counterparts for seven hours during a visit to Tehran this weekend.

Olli Heinonen, who headed the agency's Iran probe until 2010, also suggested the inquiry was at a standstill.

"The tone has changed in Iran, but there are very little movements in substance," said Heinonen, who is now with Harvard's Belfer Center think tank.

A Section on 09/04/2014