The fate of the Iran nuclear deal is on everyone’s minds right now, as the May deadline that Donald Trump set for fixing its flaws is coming up fast.

One of these flaws is the lack of independent inspections that Iranian regime’s nuclear programme has been subject to since the deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), was signed.

Under the terms of the deal, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) should be allowed to inspect any suspected location, including a military site, in Iran or under Iran’s control in other countries for nuclear activity that violates the deal.

Why Iran’s military facilities need investigating

The Iranian military and their Revolutionary Guards Corps militia were heavily involved in Iran’s malign nuclear weapons programme. They even admitted as much when the Iranian Resistance first revealed their clandestine nuclear programme in 2003. There is no reason to suspect that they would not be now.

The IAEA needs access to these sites in order to investigate whether or not Iran is working on nuclear weapons in secret, under the guise of military operations.

Iran’s refusals

Iranian regime is not allowed to declare any of these sites to be off-limits, but yet they’ve been allowed to. They’ve refused entry to sites citing an IAEA resolution that Iran has intentionally misunderstood. They’ve delayed access to others until they could clear up the area. Now it appears the IAEA is reluctant to even request access to these sites.

This is not the transparency we were promised.

If the IAEA is not allowed to inspect these sites, then Iran could be getting away with illicit nuclear activity. This is not speculation. In 2017, the Iranian Resistance gave evidence of Iran doing just that to the Western powers who signed the Iran deal.

Dr. Olli Heinonen, a senior advisor on science and non-proliferation at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the former deputy director general of the IAEA and head of its Department of Safeguard, wrote:

“Only through the rigorous implementation of the provisions of the [JCPOA and other law surrounding Iran’s nuclear programme] can the IAEA member states be assured that Iran’s nuclear program is peaceful. The IAEA is obligated to verify the correctness and completeness of Iran’s declarations, and thus there can be no sanctuaries immune from IAEA inspection. Only with a full and timely picture of how the IAEA secretariat fulfils its verification and monitoring mandate can the international community determine if Iran is complying with its part of the nuclear bargain.

Source » ncr-iran