Iran: Protecting vital nuclear facilities our right

The Iranian Foreign Ministry says the country considers protecting vital nuclear sites and facilities its inalienable right and expects the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to respect regulations it has set for safeguarding such sites.

Ministry Spokesperson Abbas Mousavi made the remarks in an interview on Thursday after the Islamic Republic’s authorities barred a female IAEA inspector, who had tested positive for suspected traces of explosive nitrates, from entering the Natanz uranium enrichment plant in central Iran on October 28.

“It is imperative for the agency’s inspectors to observe the Islamic Republic of Iran’s regulations as well as the regulations governing our important and vital facilities, because we view it as a right to protect our sensitive centers,” the spokesman noted.

Iran immediately reported the issue to the IAEA and accommodated it with relevant evidence too, he added, saying,” We are awaiting the agency’s response. We hope that the agency has a convincing response.”

If Tehran deems necessary and finds some inspectors, whom the country itself has allowed onto its soil, in default of its laws and regulations or the standing agreements, “It is natural [for the country] to be sensitive, and has to bar their entrance [into its nuclear facilities],” the Iranian official clarified.

According to Iranian Ambassador to the IAEA, Kazem Gharibabadi, a detector for explosive nitrates went off when the inspector attempted to enter the enrichment plant. Iranian authorities repeated the inspection, but detection equipment kept showing that the individual had the substance about her person.

Gharibabadi noted that the woman “sneaked out” to the bathroom while officials looked for a female employee to search her. After her return, the alarms did not go off again, but authorities found contamination in the bathroom and later on her empty handbag during a house search, the envoy said.

The incident drew the ire of the United States, with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claiming that the inspector had been “detained” in an “outrageous and unwarranted act of intimidation.” “IAEA inspectors must be allowed to conduct their critical work unimpeded,” Pompeo said in a statement afterwards.

Gharibabadi, however, noted that the Islamic Republic was entitled not to condone any behavior or action that might be against the safety and security of its nuclear installations.

Iran’s nuclear industry has been targeted in repeated acts of sabotage. In 2010, Stuxnet, a cyber weapon widely believed to have been made by the US and Israel, hit the uranium enrichment facility at Natanz, prompting Tehran to develop an indigenous firewall to secure its sensitive industrial structures against the malware.

Many of the country’s nuclear scientists have also been assassinated by Israeli agents in an attempt to forestall advancement of the country’s nuclear energy program.

IAEA to meet Iran officials in Tehran

Also on Thursday, the acting IAEA director general, Cornel Feruta, said there would be a meeting between the agency and Iranian officials in Tehran in the upcoming week.

The meeting, he added, would discuss what he called the agency’s “detecting natural uranium particles of anthropogenic origin at a location in Iran not declared to the agency.”

“We have continued our interactions with Iran since then, but have not received any additional information and the matter remains unresolved,” Feruta said.

He did not specify the origin of the allegation, but since last April, the US and Israel have been busy making a fuss about unsubstantiated Tel Aviv-sourced allegations about undeclared nuclear activity by Tehran.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has turned numerous public appearances into dramatic speeches targeting Iran, went live on television that month, putting on display what he claimed to be records from a secret warehouse in Tehran. He claimed Israeli agents had managed to break into the warehouse in an overnight raid and bring back, what he said was, evidence implicating Tehran.

Netanyahu’s vaudeville was meant to persuade the world that Iran had been lying about its nuclear program. The Israeli premier, however, did not provide even a single piece of evidence to substantiate his claim.

Tehran has rejected allegations leveled against it of undeclared nuclear activity. It has, by the same token, sternly spurned Netanyahu’s claims.