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Eurasia
May 17, 2019 www.intellinews.com I Page 18
Iran ‘scales down nuclear pact commitment by dropping uranium,
heavy water limits’
bne IntelliNews
As warned, Iran appears to have moved ahead with a reduction in its commitment to the nuclear deal – reports on May 15 indicated that Tehran has dropped the limits it had placed on the pro- duction of low-enriched uranium and heavy water.
Under the accord (formally the Joint Compre- hensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA) Iran agreed to a plan under which it could produce a maximum of 300 kilograms of low-enriched uranium, suit- able for civilian nuclear purposes but nowhere near nuclear-bomb-grade, and up to 130 tonnes of heavy water. Excess amounts of the materials would be stored or sold abroad. However, the US lately warned it would sanction foreign companies that purchase enriched uranium or heavy water from Iran as it tightened its sanctions regime with measures attacking the Islamic Republic’s nucle- ar development programme, all of its attempted oil exports and sales of industrial metals.
The moves reportedly made by Iran – communi- cated to Iranian news agencies by national secu- rity officials – do not appear to violate the JCPOA, but Iran has warned that unless the world powers still signed up to the nuclear deal – France, Ger- many, the UK, China and Russia – do not within 60 days do substantially more to assist its economy in the face of the unprecedented sanctions attack waged by the US, it will start enriching uranium at a higher level. At that point, the nuclear deal could start to unravel.
The nuclear deal caps the level of purity to which Iran can enrich uranium at 3.67%, far below the 90% needed to achieve nuclear-weapons-grade.
Iran's heavy water reactor near Arak. Under the nuclear deal, Tehran agreed
to redesign it to minimise production of plutonium. A reactor core was removed and filled with concrete.
It is also considerably below the 20%-level which Iran was achieving before the JCPOA took effect at the start of 2016.
The European Union and the foreign ministers of Germany, France and the UK say they are still committed to the JCPOA but will not accept any ultimatums from Tehran.
Central Bank of Iran (CBI) chief Abdolnasser Hemmati has this week pressed Europe to waste no more time in commencing a special payment vehicle that would help to get some extra trade between European companies and Iranian enter- prises moving. The situation is becoming more and more fraught with some reports indicating Iran’s crude oil exports could soon fall to their lowest in decades.
“The simplest solution to operationalise the Instex and STFI [Iran’s counterparty entity] mechanisms is for EU companies and entities to buy Iranian crude and for Europe to open a credit line for its exporters to start exporting to Iran,” Hemmati wrote in an Instagram post on May 13.
Separately, although both Donald Trump and Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei have this week talked down the prospect of
a military clash between their countries, May
15 saw the US announce it was pulling all non-emergency staff from Iraq and Iranian government and military officials make aggressive comments aimed at Washington and Tel Aviv.
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