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"[Arms Control Today] has become indispensable! I think it is the combination of the critical period we are in and the quality of the product. I found myself reading the May issue from cover to cover."

– Frank von Hippel
Co-Director of Program on Science and Global Security, Princeton University
June 1, 2018
Kelsey Davenport

Retaliation Against Iranian Nuclear Sites Would Be Counterproductive

Authored by Kelsey Davenport on April 15, 2024
As the Israeli government considers its response to Iran’s April 13 retaliatory attack , a strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities should be off the table. Targeting Iranian nuclear sites in reaction to a drone and missile attack that did minimal damage to Israel would be a reckless and irresponsible escalation that increases the risk of a wider regional war. Furthermore, a large-scale attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities is more likely to push Tehran to decide that developing nuclear weapons is necessary to deter future attacks. While the U.S. military rightly helped Israel shoot down the...

Europeans, U.S. Threaten Iran With IAEA Censure


April 2024
By Kelsey Davenport

European and U.S. officials threatened to pursue action against Iran at the next International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors meeting if Tehran does not meet its legally binding safeguards obligations.

The Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency holds its quarterly meeting at the agency headquarters in Vienna March 4. European and U.S. officials threatened to pursue action against Iran at the next board meeting if Tehran fails to meet its legally binding nuclear safeguards obligations. (Photo by Dean Calma / IAEA)The agency has been pressing Iran for years to account for the presence of nuclear materials at two sites that were never declared to the IAEA as part of Iran’s nuclear program. The agency assesses that one of the locations, Turquazabad, was used to store nuclear materials and equipment, and the other, Varamin, included a pilot plant for uranium milling and conversion.

In a Feb. 26 report, the IAEA said Iran did not provide the agency with “any information on the outstanding safeguards issues relevant to either of the two undeclared locations.” It added that the IAEA “will not be able to confirm the completeness and correctness” of Iran’s nuclear declaration until Tehran provides technically credible explanations for the presence of the uranium at the two locations and accounts for the current location of the nuclear materials.

France, Germany, and the United Kingdom, known as the E3, said in a March 7 statement to the IAEA board that action to “hold Iran accountable to its legal obligations is long overdue.” They made clear that they will pursue a resolution at the board’s quarterly meeting in June if there is no “decisive and substantive progress” on the safeguards investigation.

An official from one of the E3 countries told Arms Control Today in a March 12 email that several European countries favored pursuing a resolution censuring Iran for its failure to cooperate with the agency during the March board meeting, but the United States opposed the proposal.

The board last passed a resolution regarding the investigation in November 2022. That resolution said it is “essential and urgent” for Iran to clarify all outstanding safeguards issues. Following the passage of that resolution, Iran agreed in a March 2023 joint statement with the agency to “provide further information and access to address the outstanding safeguards issues.”

The E3 statement also said the board may need to consider “making a finding under Article 19 of Iran’s Safeguards Agreement,” which includes the option of reporting Iran to the UN Security Council if the agency cannot verify that all of Iran’s nuclear materials are being used for peaceful purposes.

The board reported Iran to the Security Council in 2006, a move that led to a series of council resolutions requiring Iran to halt certain nuclear activities and the imposition of sanctions when Tehran failed to implement those provisions.

Iran defended its cooperation with the IAEA in a March 5 note to the agency. The note said that Tehran has “done its utmost” to enable the IAEA to “effectively carry out verification activities.” It said that Iran has fulfilled all of its legal commitments, including under its safeguards agreement. The note repeated allegations that the IAEA assessment of the undeclared locations is “based on unreliable information and unauthentic documents.”

In a March 7 statement to the board, Laura Holgate, U.S. ambassador to the IAEA, also condemned Iran’s failure to cooperate with the IAEA investigation, but suggested that the board ask the agency to prepare a “comprehensive summary report” on Iran’s nuclear program and the “degree to which the agency is in position to verify that Iran’s program is exclusively peaceful.”

She said that if Iran continues to “delay and deflect” the agency’s inquiries, the board must consider “further action for the sake of demonstrating that no state can indefinitely thwart implementation of its…safeguards obligations [under the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty] by obstructing” the IAEA.

If the board pursues a resolution censuring Iran for failing to cooperate with the agency, Tehran is likely to retaliate. The U.S. intelligence community, in its 2024 Worldwide Threat Assessment, released March 11, assessed that Iran “probably will consider installing more advanced centrifuges, further increasing its enriched uranium stockpile, or enriching uranium to 90 percent” uranium-235 in response to a censure, further sanctions, or an attack against the nuclear program.

The intelligence community also assessed that Iran “is not currently undertaking key nuclear weapons-development activities” but that the expansion of the country’s program “better position[s] it to produce a nuclear device, if it chooses to do so.”

According to the most recent IAEA report on Iran’s nuclear program, Iran’s overall stockpile of enriched uranium grew over the last quarter. But Tehran down-blended 32 kilograms of uranium enriched to 60 percent U-235 by mixing the material with low-enriched uranium. As a result, Iran’s stockpile of 60 percent U-235 material decreased slightly from 128 kilograms to 121 kilograms.

Although a slight decrease in the stockpile of 60 percent U-235 is positive because that material can be quickly enriched to weapons-grade levels, or 90 percent U-235, the down-blending has little impact on the immediate proliferation risk posed by Iran’s nuclear program.

If Iran made the decision to produce weapons-grade uranium, it could still enrich enough material for one bomb in about a week and enough for about six bombs in a month. After that, it would take Iran an estimated six months to one year to build a bomb. But those activities would take place at covert facilities, making the weaponization process more difficult to detect and disrupt.

Holgate told the IAEA board that the United States has “serious concerns” about the 60 percent U-235 stockpile. “Iran should down-blend all, not just some, of its 60 percent stockpile, and stop all production of uranium enriched to 60 percent entirely,” she said.

The action could come at the next International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors meeting if Iran does not meet its legally binding safeguards obligations.

U.S. to Focus on Deterring North Korea


April 2024
By Kelsey Davenport

In the absence of dialogue with North Korea, the United States will redouble its efforts alongside allies to deter Pyongyang, a top U.S. official said.

South Korean and U.S. soldiers pose for photos in March after their joint live fire exercise at a military training field in Pocheon, part of an annual event. (Photo by Jung Yeon-Je/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)Washington still views negotiations with Pyongyang as the only viable pathway to peace on the Korean peninsula and remains focused on denuclearizing North Korea, Jung Pak, the U.S. senior official for North Korea, said March 5 at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

But the United States assesses that North Korea is undergoing a long-term strategic shift, Pak said. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un no longer believes that he can achieve his primary goal, preservation of the regime, through negotiations with the United States or South Korea, she said. Kim is viewing the world through a “new Cold War lens” where he believes that North Korea will benefit from aligning more closely with Russia and China, she said.

Pak said that North Korea currently is not interested in engagement, but the United States continues to reiterate its willingness to engage in talks “at any level” and on “any topic” without preconditions. If there is an opening for diplomacy, denuclearization will not happen “overnight” given the “scope of [North Korea’s] weapons activities and its proliferation,” she said, adding that denuclearization will require “interim steps.”

In the absence of dialogue, Pak said the United States will “redouble” its efforts to deter North Korean aggression.

Pak’s comments came as the United States and South Korea commenced a military exercise, called Freedom Shield, that North Korea described as an “undisguised” military threat that “can never be called defensive.”

During the exercises, the South Korean military conducted drills simulating a strike on North Korean ballistic missile launches and practiced intercepting cruise missiles. North Korea accelerated testing of what it claims are nuclear-capable cruise missiles in recent months. Cruise missiles, which are maneuverable during flight, are more difficult to intercept than ballistic missiles.

The drills also included simulating a response to a North Korean invasion. South Korean Defense Minister Shin Won-sik said that the exercises included field training for special operations forces, which must be “capable of swiftly eliminating the enemy leadership should Kim Jong Un wage war.”

Gen. Paul J. La Camera, head of U.S. forces stationed in South Korea, told The Wall Street Journal in a March 11 interview that the exercises are designed to respond to an array of threats posed by North Korea. Kim must be assured that “positive [actions] will be met with positive actions, and negative will be met with negative,” he said.

As the Freedom Shield exercises wrapped up, North Korea conducted military exercises that included paratroopers simulating an infiltration into South Korea and attacking a South Korean guard post. Kim observed parts of the exercise.

In addition to expanding its missile capabilities, North Korea appears to be working to meet Kim’s goal of expanding the country’s nuclear arsenal.

In a March 4 statement, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi said the agency is continuing to observe activities indicative of the commissioning of the light-water reactor (LWR) at the Yongbyon nuclear complex.

He said that the “continuation and further development” of North Korea’s nuclear program, including the commissioning of the LWR, “are clear violations of relevant UN Security Council resolutions and deeply regrettable.”

Grossi called on North Korea to “cooperate promptly” with the IAEA and effectively implement its safeguards agreement.

Laura Holgate, U.S. ambassador to the IAEA, told the agency’s Board of Governors in a March 6 statement that North Korea’s “dangerous, irresponsible, and escalatory nuclear rhetoric, and its unprecedented number of ballistic missile launches…threaten international peace and security and undermine the global nonproliferation regime.”

Holgate said that North Korea’s “rejection of diplomacy and dialogue underscores” that Pyongyang alone is responsible for “continued provocations.”

North Korea has not responded to U.S. offers for dialogue, but Kim’s sister, Kim Yo Jong, suggested that the country might be open to engagement with Japan.

She said that if Japan “makes a political decision to open up a new way of mending the relations,” the two countries “can open up a new future together.” In addition, if Tokyo “drops its bad habit” of criticizing Pyongyang “over its legitimate right to self-defense” and the issue of Japanese citizens abducted by North Korea, there “will be no reason for the two countries not to become close,” she said.

She appeared to be responding to a statement by Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio that called for “boldly” changing the country’s relationship with North Korea.

Washington still views negotiations as the only viable path to peace on the Korean peninsula but assesses that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is intent on aligning more closely with Russia and China.

Grossi, Putin Discuss Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant


April 2024

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) met Russian President Vladimir Putin last month to discuss the safety and security of the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine.

After the meeting in Sochi on March 6, IAEA Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi described his conversation with Putin as “professional and frank” and said the situation regarding Zaporizhzhia remains “enormously fluid and precarious.”

Russia illegally attacked the nuclear power plant in the early days of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine and continues to occupy the facility.

According to a press release from the Kremlin, Putin told Grossi that Moscow is willing to “do everything to ensure security anywhere [that Russia is] involved with nuclear energy.”

In early February, Russia’s state-run nuclear energy company Rosatom barred employees of Energoatom, the Ukrainian nuclear power company, from working at Zaporizhzhia. (See ACT, March 2024.) Grossi visited the nuclear power plant after that announcement to assess safety and security conditions there.

In a March 7 letter to the IAEA, Russia said the number of employees at Zaporizhzhia is enough “to carry out its safe operation” and scheduled maintenance. Russia said it is recruiting additional personnel and making “efforts aimed at improving the quality of life” for employees at the nuclear complex.

In a March 12 interview with Reuters, Grossi said the plant’s current staff “can do the job” but the “situation is not sustainable in the long term.”

The day after Grossi met with Putin, the IAEA Board of Governors passed a resolution demanding the “urgent withdrawal” of all unauthorized personnel from the facility and calling for the nuclear power plant “to be immediately returned to the full control of the competent Ukrainian authorities.”

This resolution is the fourth that the board has passed condemning Russia’s illegal occupation of Zaporizhzhia.—KELSEY DAVENPORT

Grossi, Putin Discuss Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant

Iran Avoids IAEA Board Censure, For Now

Authored by Kelsey Davenport on March 13, 2024
Iran avoided a censure during the March meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) Board of Governors despite Tehran’s failure to cooperate with a yearslong agency investigation into past undeclared nuclear activities. The United States and the E3 (France, Germany, and the United Kingdom) denounced Iran’s stonewalling during the quarterly board meeting and suggested that they will push for action at the June meeting if Iran does not cooperate with the agency. In a March 6 statement, the E3 said that “the need for the Board to hold Iran accountable to its legal obligations is...

Enhancing Nuclear Transparency in Iran Could Help Prevent a Wider War

News Link: 
https://www.justsecurity.org/92838/enhancing-nuclear-transparency-in-iran-could-...
Submitted by Tony Fleming on Wed, 2024-03-06 10:49
News Date: 
February 29, 2024 -05:00

Amid Rising Tensions, North, South Korea Exchange Threats


March 2024
By Kelsey Davenport

North and South Korea exchanged threats after the North Korean leader abandoned the goal of unifying the peninsula and labeled South Korea a hostile country. Despite the rising tensions, the Biden administration assesses that there is no immediate threat of a North Korean attack.

As tensions intensify between North Korea and South Korea, the North has been drawing closer to Russia. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov (R) met North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Pyongyang on Oct. 19. (Photo by Russian FMA Telegram Channel/Handout/Anadolu via Getty Images)In December, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un forsook a long-standing policy of achieving unification with South Korea at some point in the indefinite future. (See ACT, January/February 2024.) As a result of the shift, Kim said on Feb. 8 that North Korea can legally “annihilate” South Korea now that it is defined as a “hostile country.”

He said North Korea has adopted a “national policy to occupy and pacify” South Korea “in case of emergency.” North Korea’s military advances and weapons development give the country the capability to implement that policy, he added.

South Korea still supports unification, but the administration of President Yoon Suk Yeol has threatened to respond to North Korean provocations and is taking steps to increase military readiness.

In a Jan. 13 speech, Yoon called the Kim regime “irrational” and said that a “sensible regime would give up nuclear weapons and find a way for its people to live.” He said that Kim’s comments and the country’s recent military drills “constitute a provocation and threat.”

Yoon also accused North Korea of conducting “psychological warfare and activities” against South Korea and said that South Korea expected provocations from North Korea, including at the border between the two countries, over the course of the year.

South Korean Defense Minister Shin Won-sik said during a Jan. 24 visit to an air force facility that the military must be prepared to respond to North Korea, including quickly eliminating the “enemy leadership” if Pyongyang decides to go to war.

Despite the rhetoric coming from Pyongyang and Seoul, the Biden administration dismissed suggestions that North Korea is preparing for war.

Jung Pak, the senior U.S. official for North Korea at the State Department, said in a press briefing on Feb. 15 that the United States does not see any signals of “an imminent or direct attack at this point.”

Pak said Kim’s posture has not fundamentally changed, despite the decision to abandon unification.

But North Korea is continuing to develop weapons systems that are more difficult to defend against and conducting live-fire exercises, including near the Northern Limit Line, the maritime boundary between North and South Korea.

Yoshimasa Hayashi, Japan’s chief cabinet secretary, said on Feb. 15 that North Korea’s testing of missiles “from various platforms” strengthens the country’s “surprise attack capabilities.”

In January, North Korea tested new missiles, including a solid-fueled intermediate-range ballistic missile, a strategic cruise missile, and a submarine-launched cruise missile (SLCM). The systems tested are more difficult to intercept using missile defenses and are nuclear capable, according to the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). The cruise missiles also give North Korea more launch options, which makes it more difficult to preemptively target the country’s systems.

The strategic cruise missile contributes to North Korea’s “rapid counterattack posture,” KCNA said in a Jan. 31 statement.

After the SLCM launch on Jan. 28, KCNA said that Kim oversaw the launch and emphasized that “nuclear weaponization of the navy is an urgent task” and a “core requirement for building the state nuclear strategic force.”

The intermediate-range ballistic missile, tested on Jan. 14, included a maneuverable reentry vehicle, which uses a technology that can be used to make the missile more challenging for missile defenses to shoot down.

KCNA said the test successfully verified “the gliding and maneuvering characteristics of intermediate-range hypersonic maneuverable controlled warhead and the reliability of newly developed multi-stage high-thrust solid-fuel engines.”

The North Korean missile test had “nothing to do with the regional situation,” KCNA reported.

Although the Biden administration assesses that North Korea’s missile advances and rhetoric are not signs of an imminent attack, Pranay Vaddi, the U.S. National Security Council senior director for arms control, warned that the “nature of North Korea as a threat in the region could drastically change over the coming decade.”

Vaddi, speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies on Jan. 18, said that the “unprecedented level of cooperation in the military sphere” between Russia and North Korea could improve the North’s capabilities.

The United States and South Korea must continue to ensure that U.S. extended deterrence remains credible as the threat evolves, Vaddi said.

But the Biden administration sees no immediate threat of a North Korean attack. 

Russia Uses North Korean Missiles Against Ukraine


March 2024
By Kelsey Davenport

The United States accused Russia of launching North Korean ballistic missiles at Ukrainian targets and warned that Pyongyang will benefit from seeing how the missiles perform.

Russian President Vladimir Putin (L) and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un (R) are shown meeting in September in the Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s Far East region amid talk of a weapons deal. The United States recently accused Russia of launching North Korean ballistic missiles at Ukrainian targets. (Photo by Vladimir Smirnov/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)In a Jan. 4 press briefing, John Kirby, the National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications, said that Russia attacked Ukraine using North Korean ballistic missiles with a range of about 900 kilometers on Dec. 30 and Jan. 2.

The White House said in October that North Korea transferred armaments to Russia in September in violation of UN Security Council resolutions, but it appears that the Dec. 30 attack was the first time Russia used North Korean ballistic missiles against Ukraine. (See ACT, November 2023.)

The United States and its partners will impose additional sanctions on entities that facilitate the transfers of weapons and will call public attention to the arms deals, Kirby said.

He did not reference a specific North Korean ballistic missile, but experts and Ukrainian officials say missile fragments suggest Russia is using the short-range Hwasong-11A. Ukraine also accused Russia of using two Hwasong-11A missiles in a Feb. 7 attack on Kharkiv.

At a UN Security Council meeting on Jan. 10, Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia disputed the allegation and accused the United States of spreading “deliberately false information.”

During the meeting, South Korea, which joined the Security Council for a two-year term beginning in 2024, raised concerns about the knowledge North Korea will gain from providing the systems to Russia. Ambassador Hwang Joon-kook said the launches “provide valuable technical and military insights” and that Moscow’s use of the missiles will encourage Pyongyang to export missiles to other states to “rake in new revenue to further finance” its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs.

Although the Security Council did not take action against Russia, more than 50 states signed a Jan. 9 statement condemning North Korea’s export of missiles to Russia. The states said the “transfer of these weapons increases the suffering of the Ukrainian people, supports Russia’s war of aggression, and undermines the global non-proliferation regime.”

The accusations of North Korean involvement came from the United States, which promised to respond by imposing additional sanctions.

Russia Bars Ukrainian Operators From Zaporizhzhia


March 2024
By Kelsey Davenport

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has raised concerns that Russia’s decision to cut staff at the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant is compromising nuclear safety and security.

Rafael Mariano Grossi (C), director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), visited the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant on Feb. 7, a week after Russia announced that workers employed by Energoatom, the Ukrainian nuclear energy company, would no longer be allowed to work at the site. (Photo by Fredrik Dahl/IAEA)IAEA Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi visited the facility on Feb. 7, a week after Russia announced that workers employed by Energoatom, the Ukrainian nuclear energy company, would no longer be allowed to work at the site.

After Russia illegally attacked and occupied the Zaporizhzhia complex in March 2022 as part of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, it brought in employees from Rosatom, the Russian state-run nuclear company, to operate the nuclear power plant and pressured Ukrainian employees to sign contracts with Rosatom. Until Feb. 1, 120 Energoatom employees were still working there. Following the announcement, Russia informed the IAEA that it had sufficient personnel to run the facility without the 120 Energoatom staffers. Russia said it was necessary to bar Energoatom employees from the site to operate the plant in line with Russian regulations.

After his visit, Grossi said the number of staff is “significantly reduced” from prewar levels and warned that even though the reactor units are in shutdown mode, “the plant still requires sufficient numbers of qualified personnel to conduct both operational tasks and to ensure that equipment important for nuclear safety and security is properly maintained.”

Prior to visiting the Zaporizhzhia plant, Grossi met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and various Ukrainian officials, including Petro Kotin, the head of Energoatom. Grossi said his agency is working to “assess the operational impact of this [Russian] decision.” There is “absolutely no place for complacency” regarding the security and safety of the facility, he said.

In January, the IAEA team at the Zaporizhzhia complex notified the agency that Russia mined the area between the internal and external fences surrounding the site. Russia previously had placed landmines in that zone, but removed them in November 2023.

In a Jan. 19 statement, Grossi said the use of landmines is inconsistent with IAEA standards for nuclear safety.

Russia defended its decision in a Jan. 31 statement to the IAEA, saying that landmines “do not pose any threat to personnel” at the Zaporizhzhia plant and that their use “does not contradict any IAEA recommendations.”

Russia said that landmines are necessary “to deter potential saboteurs.” It argued that deterring sabotage “corresponds” to the five IAEA principles for ensuring the safety and security of the plant, specifically that all structures at the facility must be “protected from attacks or acts of sabotage.” Grossi introduced the five principles at a UN Security Council meeting in May 2023 and continues to reiterate their importance. (See ACT, June 2023.)

In addition to staffing and landmines, Grossi raised additional concerns about nuclear safety and security during a Jan. 25 briefing to the Security Council. He said that the IAEA expert team at the Zaporizhzhia site “has not had timely access to some areas of the plant” and stressed that access is necessary to “effectively conduct” assessments of safety and security.

After the Feb. 8 visit, Grossi emphasized that IAEA personnel must be able to ask questions about conditions at the site. He said that “there were situations where there were suggestions that [agency experts should] look but not talk.” Preventing questions “is not good,” Grossi said.

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency said Russia’s decision to cut staff at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant compromises safety. 

IAEA Warns Iran About Lack of Transparency


March 2024
By Kelsey Davenport

Iran’s failure to provide full transparency into its nuclear program is increasing risk, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) warned.

Rafael Mariano Grossi, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, appearing at the the World Government Summit in Dubai on Feb. 13, says that Iran’s failure to provide full transparency into its nuclear program is increasing risk. (Photo by RYAN LIM/AFP via Getty Images)IAEA Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi said on Feb. 13 that Iran is “not entirely transparent” regarding its nuclear activities, which “increases dangers,” particularly given the “accumulation of complexities” in the Middle East.

In addition to seeking answers about undeclared uranium activities at two sites from the pre-2003 period, when Iran had a nuclear weapons program, Iran is not providing the IAEA with design information about new nuclear facilities, as required by its safeguards agreement, or following through on a voluntary commitment in March 2023 to enhance agency monitoring at sites that support the country’s nuclear program but do not hold fissile materials.

Grossi, speaking at the World Governor’s Summit in Dubai, also referenced an uptick in “loose talk about nuclear weapons” in Iran and said a “very high official said…we have everything” to make a nuclear weapon.

Grossi’s remarks appeared to refer to a comment by Ali Akhbar Salehi, former foreign minister and head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) from 2013 to 2020. Asked if Iran has the capability to produce nuclear weapons in a Feb. 11 interview with Nasim TV, Salehi said that the country has crossed “all the scientific and technological nuclear thresholds” necessary to build a weapon.

Salehi’s declaration that Iran has a nuclear weapons capability is not surprising. The U.S. intelligence community has long assessed that Iran has the technical and scientific capacity to build a nuclear weapon if the political decision is made to do so.

Iranian officials, including the current head of the AEOI, Mohammad Eslami, continue to say Iran is not interested in nuclear weapons. In a Jan. 13 interview with Ofogh TV, Eslami said that nuclear weapons are not part of Iran’s defense and security strategy. He said Iran can build a nuclear arsenal but “we do not want to do it.”

Regardless, clashes between the United States and Iranian-backed forces in the region increase the risk that Tehran could determine that the benefits of pursuing nuclear weapons outweigh the costs.

Iran’s nuclear advances since U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew the United States from the 2015 nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, in May 2018 would allow Tehran to produce enough weapons-grade fissile material for five bombs in about four weeks. U.S. officials have suggested that the weaponization process could take another six to 12 months.

The speed at which Iran could produce enough fissile material for a nuclear weapon is due largely to Iran’s growing stockpile of uranium enriched to 60 percent uranium-235, a level just shy of the 90 percent-enriched U-235 that is considered weapons grade.

The IAEA reported in December that Iran accelerated the production of 60 percent-enriched U-235 after a decrease in production from June through November. But in a Feb. 19 interview with Reuters, Grossi said Iran had again decreased the rate of production.

He said Iran’s recent changes to the rate of production of 60 percent-enriched U-235 “does not alter the fundamental trend,” which is a “constant increase in inventory” of highly enriched uranium.”

Iran does not have any practical need for uranium enriched to 60 percent U-235. The country’s sole operating nuclear power reactor, at Bushehr, runs on uranium enriched to less than 5 percent U-235, and Russia provides that fuel. Iran operates a research reactor with fuel that uses uranium enriched to 20 percent U-235, which Tehran imports.

Iran recently announced the start of construction on several new reactors but none of the units will require fuel with 60 percent-enriched U-235.

On Feb. 5, Eslami said Iran began pouring the foundation for a new research reactor at Esfahan that will be used to produce isotopes for medical treatments and industrial purposes.

The previous week, Iran began constructing a new nuclear power plant. The site, located on Iran’s east coast, will include four reactor units and take nine years to build, according to Eslami.

Iran did not notify the IAEA when it began construction of these facilities, as required under its safeguards agreement. Iran maintains that it suspended the safeguards provision, known as modified Code 3.1, that requires it to notify the agency when the decision is made to construct a new nuclear facility. Iran says it will abide by the previous requirements, which stipulate that a country must notify the IAEA 180 days before nuclear material is introduced into a facility.

The IAEA argues that Iran cannot unilaterally suspend modified Code 3.1. The agency changed the notification requirements to give inspectors a longer lead time to develop effective safeguards.

While in Davos for the World Economic Forum in January, Grossi emphasized the importance of Iran providing more transparency regarding its nuclear program. He also said it is “unacceptable” for Iran to “hold the IAEA hostage” over “political disputes with others.” Specifically, Grossi said Iran is punishing the agency because of actions taken by France, the United Kingdom, and the United States that Iran’s leaders consider to be objectionable.

He called for diplomacy to prevent the “situation deteriorating to a degree where it would be impossible to retrieve.”

Risks associated with Iran’s nuclear program are heightened by “complexities” in the Middle East, the IAEA chief said.

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