What are salient features of Iran Nuclear Deal and what Putin and Obama say about this Agreement?
Monitoring Desk: Iran signed a deal on Tuesday with P5+1 to limit its sensitive nuclear activities in return for the lifting of crippling sanctions. P5+1 group that includes US, UK, France, China, Russia and Germany.
What are salient features of the deal?
There are two uranium enrichment facilities in Iran – Natanz and Fordo where Iran can enrich 90% needed to produce nuclear weapons. It currently has almost 20,000. Under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) agreed on 14 July, it will be limited to installing no more than 5,060 of the oldest and least efficient centrifuges at Natanz for 10 years.
Iran’s uranium stockpile will also be reduced by 98% to 300kg (660lbs) for 15 years. It must also keep its level of enrichment at 3.67%.
Research and development will take place only at Natanz and be limited for eight years.
No enrichment will be permitted at Fordo for 15 years, and the underground facility will be converted into a nuclear, physics and technology centre.
The 1,044 centrifuges at the site will produce radioisotopes for use in medicine, agriculture, industry and science.
Iran has been building a heavy-water nuclear facility near the town of Arak. Spent fuel from a heavy-water reactor contains plutonium suitable for a nuclear bomb.
Iran has agreed to redesign the reactor so it cannot produce any weapons-grade plutonium and presents less of a proliferation threat.
Iran will also not be permitted to build additional heavy-water reactors or accumulate heavy water for 15 years.
Inspectors from International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will continuously monitor declared nuclear sites and also verify that no fissile material is moved covertly to a secret location to build a bomb. IAEA Safeguards Agreement will allow inspectors to access any site they deem suspicious. IAEA inspectors will also be able to request visits to military sites. However, Iran will have the right to challenge the IAEA request and an arbitration panel will then decide on the issue.
Iran will not see sanctions lifted until the IAEA confirms that it has followed through with its end of the JCPOA.
If Iran violates any aspect of the deal, the UN sanctions will automatically “snap back” into place for 10 years, with the possibility of a five-year extension.
An eight-member Joint Commission comprising representatives of the P5+1 nations, the EU and Iran will be established to monitor compliance. If the commission cannot resolve a dispute, it will be referred to the UN Security Council.
Iran has also agreed to the continuation of the UN arms embargo on the country for up to five years.
A UN ban on the import of ballistic missile technology also remains in place for up to eight years.
Iran will give up the bulk of its nuclear program, namely its enriched uranium (nuclear fuel) and its centrifuges (which turn fuel into weapons material). That will leave it with a program way too small to build a bomb.
What Iran will get out of Nuclear deal?
Iran will enjoy lifting of all economic and social sanctions. The essential idea behind the deal is that in exchange for limits on its nuclear activities, Iran would get relief from sanctions while being allowed to continue its atomic program for peaceful purposes.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said:
“Russia welcomes the agreement reached today in Vienna on a settlement of the situation concerning Iran’s nuclear programme and the joint comprehensive plan of action approved by the six countries and Iran. We are certain that the world heaved a sigh of relief today. The negotiations supported by the UN Security Council and involving Russia, China, the USA, France, Germany, Great Britain, Iran and the European Union went on for many years. We are satisfied that the solution found is based on the principle of phasing and mutuality which our country has been consistently supporting at every stage of these complicated negotiations.
The comprehensive agreement rests on the solid foundation of international law, primarily the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and the IAEA Safeguards, including the additional protocol. Despite the attempts to validate any scenarios based on the use of force, the parties to the negotiations made a choice in favour of stability and cooperation, which will be reflected in a corresponding UN Security Council resolution.
We are grateful to all those who invariably supported efforts to find reliable political and diplomatic solutions to the Iranian issue. The Russian negotiating team and nuclear experts have made a significant expert contribution to the drafting of the comprehensive arrangements, which made it possible to align the different, often opposing views. The IAEA will carefully monitor the implementation of the agreed steps to prove the exclusively peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear programme.
Iran gets the opportunity to develop this programme, including uranium enrichment, under IAEA control and with the gradual lifting of sanctions imposed against Tehran, something we have long called for. This is also important for the implementation of large-scale plans of peaceful nuclear cooperation between Russia and Iran that got support in the documents approved today.
We expect that all the parties concerned, primarily the six states involved in the negotiations, will comply with the deal in full. The political will demonstrated by these six states and Iran in the course of these negotiations is a guarantee of the successful implementation of the plan of action designed for the long term. Our bilateral relations with Iran will receive a new impetus and will no longer be influenced by external factors”.
US President Obama said:
“After two years of negotiations, the United States, together with our international partners, has achieved something that decades of animosity has not: a comprehensive long-term deal with Iran that will prevent it from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
This deal demonstrates that American diplomacy can bring about real and meaningful change, change that makes our country and the world safer and more secure.
This deal is also in line with a tradition of American leadership. It’s now more than 50 years since President Kennedy stood before the American people and said, “Let us never negotiate out of fear, but let us never fear to negotiate.” He was speaking then about the need for discussions between the United States and the Soviet Union, which led to efforts to restrict the spread of nuclear weapons.
In those days, the risk was a catastrophic nuclear war between two superpowers. In our time, the risk is that nuclear weapons will spread to more and more countries, particularly in the Middle East, the most volatile region in our world.
Today, because America negotiated from a position of strength and principle, we have stopped the spread of nuclear weapons in this region. Because of this deal, the international community will be able to verify that the Islamic Republic of Iran will not develop a nuclear weapon.
This deal meets every single one of the bottom lines that we established when we achieved a framework this spring. Every pathway to a nuclear weapon is cut off, and the inspection and transparency regime necessary to verify that objective will be put in place. Because of this deal, Iran will not produce the highly enriched uranium and weapons-grade plutonium that form the raw materials necessary for a nuclear bomb.
Because of this deal, Iran will remove two thirds of its installed centrifuges, the machines necessary to produce highly enriched uranium for a bomb and store them under constant international supervision. Iran will not use its advanced centrifuges to produce enriched uranium for the next decade. Iran will also get rid of 98 percent of its stockpile of enriched uranium.
President of Iran Hassan Rouhani said:
“Negotiators have reached a good agreement and I announce to our people that our prayers have come true”.
The chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency Yukiya Amano said:
I have designed a “roadmap” with the Iranian government for the clarification of past and present outstanding issues regarding Iran’s nuclear program.”
