Iran will give ‘proportionate’ response to any action by IAEA Board of Governors: Foreign Ministry spokesman

Asked about the possible adoption of an anti-Iran resolution during the Board of Governors’ meeting, Saeed Khatibzadeh, who was speaking in a televised interview on Monday, said, “We shall not pass any judgment in advance, but we will give our answers in proportion to any measure that is taken” by the Agency.

He added that IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi has unfortunately issued a “hasty” report on Iran that he had already presented to the European Parliament.

The Iranian spokesperson emphasized that the IAEA chief’s report “overlooks all the measures and responses that Iran has provided with precision and in a technical way,” noting that the report is “not accurate.”

Khatibzadeh said that Iran accepts neither the IAEA report nor the efforts by the United States and the three European signatories to the 2015 deal — France, Britain and Germany — to push for an anti-Iran resolution at the Board of Governors in contradiction to the principles of diplomacy and in defiance of the ongoing developments.

Iran does not regard the US-E3 resolution as constructive and believes that it will have adverse effects both on Iran-IAEA cooperation and the negotiations between Tehran and the P4+1 group of countries which aim to revive the deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), he added.

Khatibzadeh said those who sponsor such a resolution must know that Iran does not accept it and urges all members of the 35-nation board to be wary of ill-intentions of the Zionist regime and reject it.

In such a case, he noted, “the window that Iran has created for diplomacy will be kept open.”

The UN nuclear agency on Monday began its regular Board of Governors meeting in Vienna, with Iran’s nuclear issue and Tehran’s cooperation with the agency expected to take center stage.

During the event, the Board of Governors is supposed to adopt an anti-Iranian resolution drafted by the European troika and the United States, which aims to accuse Tehran of withholding cooperation with the IAEA and not doing enough to resolve the so-called outstanding issues.

Iran has frequently warned that in case the agency drifts away from its technical nature and makes a politicized decision related to Iran’s peaceful nuclear program, the country will respond in kind.

In a phone conversation with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov on Friday, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said the “unconstructive” move by the US and its European allies to push for the anti-Tehran resolution would disrupt the process of the JCPOA revival negotiations.

The top Iranian diplomat warned that the parties obstructing the diplomatic path bear responsibility for the consequences of any potential resolution against the Islamic Republic during a meeting of the IAEA’s Board of Governors.

The meeting is taking place as a pause in the marathon negotiations to salvage the JCPOA entered its third month, with prospects described by Washington as “tenuous at best.” Tehran blames the US and its allies France, Britain, and Germany for failing to act constructively.

Under the JCPOA, Iran accepted certain caps on its nuclear program in exchange for the removal of international sanctions.

The US, however, unilaterally abandoned the deal in 2018 and re-imposed crippling sanctions despite Tehran’s full compliance with its share of obligations.