Riyadh makes new accusations against Iran’s nuclear program

Abdullah bin Khalid bin Sultan al-Saud accused Iran of lacking transparency in dealing with the IAEA’s demands for four sites at an IAEA meeting on Thursday.

He went on to say that Iran’s responses to the nuclear sites were “unsatisfactory,” claiming that the responses were technically invalid.

The Saudi official also accused Tehran of not being serious in its interaction with the IAEA, claiming that Iran was unable to answer questions from the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Abdullah bin Khalid called Iran’s action in not following the Additional Protocol sabotage, accusing Iran of pursuing what it called misleading policies.

Riyadh’s representative continued to accuse Iran of creating tensions in the region and trying to endanger the stability and security of the region by repeating his country’s repeated claims.

He also called on Tehran to respond immediately to the demands and questions of the IAEA, to enter “seriously” into the current negotiations within the framework of the JCPOA and to refrain from 60% enrichment, installation of advanced centrifuges and production of enriched uranium.

The Saudi envoy had previously made similar allegations against Tehran, without mentioning the unilateral withdrawal of its ally, the United States, from the JCPOA.

Tehran is now engaged in Vienna talks with the remaining participants in the Iran nuclear deal (JCPOA) namely China, Russia, and the three major European countries of Britain, Germany and France in a bid to revive the nuclear deal. The United States is not present as Iran has refused to directly talk with the new US administration that still continues illegal Trump-era sanctions against the Iranian nation.

Despite early promises during his presidential campaign, US President Joe Biden has not returned his country to the deal so far. By doing so, the Biden administration is following in the Trump administration’s footsteps and continues to stick to the illegal sanctions on Iran in violation of the nuclear deal. Washington has set illegitimate preconditions for returning to the JCPOA which are strongly rejected by Iran.

After the US exit from the world powers’ nuclear deal with Iran in May 2018 and imposing the unprecedented sanctions on the Iranian nation which was followed by the indifference of the European parties to the need for compensating Iran’s losses as a result of the US violations of the international accord, Iran started reducing its JCPOA commitments in five steps and finally suspended voluntary implementation of the Additional Protocol on February 22. Tehran recently started 60% enrichment after an “act of sabotage” done reportedly carried out by the Israeli regime on one of its nuclear sites in Natanz. The JCPOA Paragraph 36 allows Iran to diminish its abidance in the case of violations of the deal by other parties.

Iran has vowed that it will change course and will return immediately to its JCPOA commitments as soon as other parties, most notably the Europeans, abide by the provisions of the accord.