IAEA talks with Iran unsuccessful

Time is running out for the U.N. atomic watchdog to gain access to re-install cameras at a centrifuge-parts workshop in Iran, as the agency will soon be unable to guarantee equipment is not being diverted to make atom bombs, its chief said on Wednesday, Reuters reported.

International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Rafael Grossi was speaking the day after a trip to Tehran in which he said he made no progress on several disputes, the most pressing of which is getting access to the workshop at the TESA Karaj complex two months after Iran promised to grant it.

The workshop makes parts for advanced centrifuges – machines that enrich uranium – and was the victim of apparent sabotage in June. Tehran blames Israel for what it says was an attack, which destroyed one of four IAEA cameras there. Iran later removed all the cameras and the destroyed camera’s footage is missing.

“We are close to the point where I would not be able to guarantee continuity of knowledge,” Grossi told a news conference on the first day of a quarterly meeting of his agency’s 35-nation Board of Governors.

That would mean there was a gap in IAEA monitoring of sensitive installations, during which a significant amount of material or equipment could be siphoned off to a secret nuclear weapons programme.

The IAEA has repeatedly said it has no indication that Iran has a secret weapons programme, and Iran insists its aims are peaceful. But Grossi said he still does not know whether Karaj is operational or not five months after the apparent attack.