Azerbaijan, Baku, Jan. 22 /Trend S.Isayev, T. Jafarov/
There is no minimal chance for Iran-IAEA talks, a professor at the University of Glasgow and expert on nuclear issues Reza Taghizadeh, said commenting on the recent UN nuclear watchdog's visit to Iran.
Hopes for defusing the Iranian nuclear crisis were thwarted Wednesday when the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said Iran did not agree to clear up nuclear weapons allegations and refused access to Parchin military complex during a visit by senior agency officials.
Parchin is is an Iranian military complex, located about 30 km southeast of Tehran. To the northwest of Parchin in the Barjamali Hills, a test range for liquid-propellant missile engines is part of the Shahid Hemat Industrial Group (SHIG) research facility.
Although under the NPT rules Iran is not required to allow inspectors into its military bases, on January 13, 2005, IAEA inspectors were allowed partial access to the Parchin military base as a confidence building measure.
Back then the IAEA's 2006 report indicated that "The Agency did not observe any unusual activities in the buildings visited, and the results of the analysis of environmental samples did not indicate the presence of nuclear material at those locations." Visual inspection showed that sites were not as capable as suggested by satellite imagery.
The world's nuclear watchdog said it had made intensive efforts to agree on a document that outlines how Iran would answer outstanding questions about its suspect nuclear activities and give access to documents, officials and locations.
"Unfortunately, agreement was not reached on this document," the IAEA said.
"Opinions of Iran and IAEA are completely different," Taghizadeh told Trend. "I expect a harsh report from IAEA's Commitee of Directors on the latest visit to Iran".
Taghizadeh also stressed that he expects a UN Security Council Resolution on Iran's nuclear program.
Taghizadeh underscored that a report on the visit to Iran will probably be released by IAEA in early March. He added that both visits to Iran from the IAEA side did not give any significant results.
Speaking about the reasons why Iran denied the IAEA inspectors enter the Parchin military base, Taghizadeh believes that it was done due to security reasons.
"Iran has the highest security measures concerning its nuclear program because of economic pressure and military threats," the expert said.
While during the first visit to Parchin military base in 2006, IAEA did not observe any unusual activities, and visual inspection proved there was no nuclear bomb, the latest aeroshots of Parchin revealed a big egg-like metal capsule, which could be a test bomb. Iran however refused to allow nuclear inspectors to see the actual thing.
"Iran suspects that IAEA was provided with information about country's nuclear facility from the outside," Taghizadeh added. "Iran does not trust IAEA, and country's nuclear scientists are not allowed to meet with the inspectors because of the latest fatal incidents with other Iranian nuclear scientists".
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