Iran has further increased its stockpile of uranium enriched to near weapons-grade levels, a confidential report on Monday by the UN’s nuclear watchdog said, the latest in Tehran’s attempts to steadily exert pressure on the international community.
Iran is seeking to have economic sanctions imposed over the nation’s controversial nuclear program lifted in exchange for slowing the program down. The program is under the guidance of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and that likely would not change in the wake of last week’s helicopter crash that killed Iran’s president and foreign minister.
The report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said that as of May 11, Iran had 142.1kg of uranium enriched up to 60 percent — an increase of 20.6kg since the last report by the UN agency in February.
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Uranium enriched at 60 percent purity is just a short, technical step away from weapons-grade levels of 90 percent.
By the IAEA’s definition, about 42kg of uranium enriched to 60 percent is the amount at which creating one atomic weapon is theoretically possible — if the material is enriched further, to 90 percent.
Iran’s overall stockpile of enriched uranium stood at 6,201.3kg, an increase of 675.8kg since the IAEA’s previous report.
Iran has maintained its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only, but IAEA Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi has previously warned that Tehran has enough uranium enriched to near-weapons-grade levels to make “several” nuclear bombs if it chose to do so.
He has acknowledged the UN agency cannot guarantee that none of Iran’s centrifuges might have been peeled away for clandestine enrichment.
Tensions have grown between Iran and the IAEA since 2018, when then-US president Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew the US from Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers. Since then, Iran has abandoned all limits the deal put on its program and quickly stepped up enrichment.
Under the original nuclear deal, struck in 2015, Iran was allowed to enrich uranium only up to 3.67 percent purity, maintain a stockpile of about 300kg and use only very basic IR-1 centrifuges — machines that spin uranium gas at high speed for enrichment purposes.
Monday’s report also said that Tehran has not reconsidered its decision in September last year to bar IAEA inspectors from further monitoring its nuclear program, adding that it expects Iran “to do so in the context of the ongoing consultations between the agency and Iran.”
In the report, Grossi said he “deeply regrets” Iran’s decision to bar inspectors, and a reversal of that decision “remains essential to fully allow the agency to conduct its verification activities in Iran effectively.”
The deaths of then-Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi and then-minister of foreign affairs Hossein Amirabdollahian have triggered a pause in the IAEA’s talks with Tehran over improving cooperation, the report said.
Before the May 19 helicopter crash, Iran had agreed to hold technical negotiations with IAEA on May 20, following a visit by Grossi earlier in the month, but those meetings fell apart due to the crash.
Iran then sent a letter on Tuesday last week, saying its nuclear team wants to continue discussions in Tehran “on an appropriate date that will be mutually agreed upon,” the report said.
The report added that Iran has still not provided answers to the IAEA’s years-long investigation about the origin and current location of manmade uranium particles found at two locations — Varamin and Turquzabad — that Tehran has failed to declare as potential nuclear sites.
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