VIENNA: The head of the UN nuclear agency called on Iran yesterday to sign a deal giving greater transparency on its nuclear drive and announced that new talks with Tehran would be held this week.
At the opening of a week-long meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency board in Vienna, Yukiya Amano also urged Tehran to allow access to a suspect military site near the capital. “I invite Iran to sign and implement... as soon as possible” an agreement that would allow access to sites, documents and people related to its nuclear program, Amano said. Announcing a new round of talks between the IAEA and Iran in Vienna on Friday, Amano said Tehran needed to do more to alleviate Western fears it is developing a nuclear bomb by complying fully with international obligations.
“Iran is not providing the necessary cooperation to enable the agency to provide credible assurance about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities in Iran, and therefore to conclude that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful activities,” he told the board of governors. He also urged Iran “to provide access to the Parchin site,” where the IAEA believes suspicious testing has been carried out.
After a visit to Tehran on May 21, where he met Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili, Amano had said an accord could be signed “quite soon,” but there is still no sign of any deal two weeks on.
