Spokesman: Grave Consequences Discouraged Amano from Revealing Iran’s Secrets to US Senate

Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Yukiya Amano didn’t disclose secrets of its recent agreement with Iran to the US Congress for the fear of its aftermaths, an Iranian spokesman said Monday.

“In a letter to Yukiya Amano, we underlined that if the secrets of the agreement (roadmap between Iran and the IAEA) are revealed, we will lose our trust in the Agency; and despite the US Congress’s pressures, he didn’t give any information to them,” Spokesman of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Behrouz Kamalvandi said in a meeting with the Iranian lawmakers in Tehran on Monday.

“Had he done so, he himself would have been harmed,” he added.

In relevant remarks early this month, Iran’s Envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency Reza Najafi warned the UN nuclear watchdog to avoid disclosing its secret agreements with Tehran.

“The agreements signed between a member country and the IAEA are definitely secret and cannot be presented to any other country at all,” Najafi said.

Referring to the discussions at the US Congress during which the US officials elaborated on the nuclear agreement between Iran and the Group 5+1 (the US, Russia, China, Britain and France plus Germany), he said, “The discussions revealed that the secret texts between Iran and the Agency have not even been provided to the US administration.”

“For the very same reason, they cannot be presented to the Senate members either,” Najafi added.

He also said that Tehran has already warned the IAEA chief against the repercussions of a disclosure of its agreement with the UN nuclear watchdog agency.

“Iran has clarified it to Amano that the text of its understanding with the IAEA cannot be presented to the Senate,” Najafi reiterated.

He further warned that “the Agency knows what it means to disclose a secret document”.

The Iranian envoy also cautioned Amano that he is duty bound now to accept possible invitations of other countries’ legislatures after he accepted to attend a US Senate meeting.

Amano and Head of the AEOI Ali Akbar Salehi signed a roadmap of cooperation in Vienna on July 14.

The roadmap contains secret arrangements stated in one or two documents entailing on the methods to be used by the two sides in their cooperation.

Senior Iranian nuclear officials have said that all IAEA member states have such secret agreements and the UN nuclear watchdog is duty bound to keep them secret to any third party individual or state.

After the roadmap was signed, Salehi announced that the new agreement would fully settle all unresolved issues pertaining to Tehran’s nuclear activities in the past.

“All past issues will be resolved completely after Iran and the Agency adopt some measures,” Salehi told reporters after signing an agreement called the Iran-IAEA Cooperation ‘Roadmap’.

He said that all agreements, including the measures decided for Parchin military site, will be implemented with full respect to Iran’s redlines.

Iran had earlier announced that inspection of the country’s military sites are one of its redlines.

“I hope that a new chapter in relations and cooperation between Iran and the IAEA will start after the settlement of the past issues,” Salehi added.

Salehi made the remarks in Vienna just a short time after diplomats acknowledged a sum-up agreement had been made between world powers and Iran.