Ahmadinejad's Office Denies Zarif's Claims About Interviews with Nuclear Scientists

The office of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, former President of Iran, issued a statement on Tuesday, June 5, calling the remarks of Mohammad Javad Zarif regarding interviews conducted by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) officials with Iranian nuclear scientists during the previous administration "utterly false." Zarif, the foreign minister under President Hassan Rouhani, stated on Monday, June 4, that during the previous Iranian administration, IAEA officials interviewed nuclear scientists to supposedly "resolve claims and excuses." In response to these comments, Ahmadinejad's office declared on Tuesday that "as a definitive policy" during the ninth and tenth administrations, "any interviews, interrogations, or meetings with IAEA officials or any other foreign international entities" with Iranian nuclear scientists were "explicitly and officially" prohibited by the head of the government. The release of this statement comes in the wake of the assassination of several Iranian "nuclear scientists" in recent years, during which some conservative figures claimed that information about these scientists was provided to Western intelligence agencies through their interviews. For instance, Rasoul Sanaei Rad, a political deputy of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), stated on May 17 in an interview with the Dana website that "the martyrdom of our nuclear scientists was also due to these interviews conducted under the guise of safeguards, which later provided information about these scientists to terrorists." Additionally, according to the Tabnak website, Mehdi Mohammadi, a media collaborator of the former nuclear team, mentioned in a televised debate that the IAEA was an "information source" that led to the assassination of Majid Shahriari, one of Iran's nuclear scientists. The Mehr news agency also reported on Sunday, January 14, 2012, that Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, deputy commercial director of the Natanz site, had met with IAEA inspectors shortly before his assassination. However, Fereydoun Abbasi, former head of the Atomic Energy Organization during Ahmadinejad's presidency, denied reports about Majid Shahriari's interview with IAEA inspectors. Meanwhile, the Shargh newspaper reported on Tuesday, June 5, that the history of interviews with Iranian nuclear scientists dates back to the presidency of Ali Larijani during nuclear negotiations. After Ahmadinejad was elected president in 2005, Ali Larijani, head of the Supreme National Security Council, became the head of Iran's negotiation team. Larijani stated on February 9, 2008, in an interview with the ISNA news agency that "the Additional Protocol defines that whenever IAEA inspectors wish, they can interview anyone they want, but I do not grant such permission in this modality; rather, I ask them for explanations to resolve that issue, and after review, I grant permission if they wish." The Shargh newspaper also reported that in IAEA reports from November 2007, there was an emphasis on interviews with "individuals" and it was stated [first line, paragraph 42] that "Iran has provided sufficient access to individuals." According to this report, the IAEA also emphasized in March 2008 that Iran "has provided the agency access to the requested individuals."