Iran and IAEA's Challenging Roadmap That Is 'Not Confidential'

Hours before the official announcement of Iran and the 1+5 group reaching a nuclear agreement on July 14, Yukiya Amano, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), after intensive negotiations with Iranian officials, went to the Coburg Hotel in downtown Vienna and signed a memorandum of understanding with Ali Akbar Salehi, head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran. The text of this understanding was published on the same day and indicated a timeline for cooperation between Iran and the Agency in the coming weeks and months. The lack of details about this understanding and the method of verification of Iran's current and past actions are among the contentious issues these days. In Iran, on one hand, critics are worried about the disclosure of the country's security and defense secrets due to cooperation with the Agency, and in the U.S. Congress, critics say that what has been received for review as a comprehensive agreement is incomplete without mentioning the details of the understanding between Iran and the Agency. The subject of the understanding between Iran and the IAEA is addressing Iran's current and past actions. Ali Akbar Salehi states that this is a new name for what Iran previously referred to as alleged studies, while the other side calls it PMD or the possible military dimensions of Iran's nuclear program. Salehi mentioned on Iranian state television that this understanding is not confidential, and part of it will remain only between Iran and this international body, which relates to 'the process of safeguards inspections and how inspections are conducted.' The issue of the possible military dimensions of Iran's nuclear program has been one of the very sensitive issues in years of nuclear negotiations between Iran and the 1+5 group as well as the IAEA. Mark Fitzpatrick, director of the disarmament program at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, comments on the sensitivity of this issue and the non-publication of details of the Iran-IAEA agreements, saying: 'The fact that not all information regarding the understanding between Iran and the Agency is published has fueled more suspicion and speculation. Personally, I do not think this is a problem since this issue is part of the Agency's cooperation with an independent country and falls within the framework of confidential safeguards issues. However, since the entire nuclear agreement with Iran is highly politicized, the more information that is released, the better.' Before Iran and the Agency reached the understanding and the new roadmap intended to resolve the PMD issue, the Director General of the Agency, who had traveled to Tehran amid final negotiations, stated after returning to Vienna that this international body could comment on this matter by the end of this calendar year, with December 15 set as the deadline for the Agency to review Iran's responses and provide a summary in this regard. Some have expressed surprise at how an issue that has taken years to resolve, with Iran repeatedly rejecting the other side's claims, could be resolved in such a short time. Mark Hibbs, a senior analyst at the Carnegie Berlin Foundation, says: 'Many involved in the research and verification of the nuclear program may not be overly optimistic about resolving the PMD issue in this timeframe, but there has likely been quiet progress in Iran-IAEA cooperation since the beginning of this year. Around the end of 2014, after a year of cooperation, Iran halted its collaboration and told the Agency that it did not trust the Agency's claims. They even sent a formal letter to the Agency in this regard.' Hibbs adds: 'We hear from experts in the Agency and close to this body that cooperation has resumed since the end of 2014 or the beginning of 2015, and bilateral relations have not been so tense, which may mean that progress is more than we are aware of, and planning to resolve this issue within less than six months seems reasonable.' One of the issues related to the understanding between Iran and the Agency, which will also be significant during the lifespan of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), is the issue of access and inspections, which Iranian negotiators say will be based on agreements made, all within conventional frameworks and red lines. The conventional frameworks that Iranian officials refer to are the Agency's safeguards and the Additional Protocol, which Iran will implement voluntarily and at some point during the years of the agreement must also be approved by the Islamic Consultative Assembly. Mark Fitzpatrick in London believes that the various stages in the agreement create an incentive for Iran to provide these conventional access rights to Agency inspectors, whether in the early months to resolve the PMD issue or in later years to receive confirmation of its entire nuclear program. A section of the new understanding between Iran and the Agency refers to the Parchin military facilities, which will be addressed through separate planning. Fitzpatrick comments on this mechanism: 'It seems to me that both sides have made decisions regarding Parchin. This issue has been discussed for months and years, and I recall that two years ago, both sides reached an initial agreement in this regard, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had accepted it. However, when Agency inspectors went to finalize the work, the atmosphere had changed, and it seemed that part of the Iranian establishment, for example, the IRGC or hardline forces, opposed it. As a result, I think what the Iranian Foreign Ministry was prepared to do in previous years is still on paper and, with some changes, is part of the understanding but has not yet been publicly announced.' In the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, cooperation between Iran and the Agency is based on an understanding of a roadmap to resolve remaining current and past issues, which is considered one of the ways to ensure transparency and build trust in Iran's nuclear program.