Iran Remains Nuclear Ready

AP confirms: U.S. nuke deal to allow Iran 6,000 centrifuges for continued uranium enrichment

Allahpundit

Posted at 11:21 am on March 19, 2015

So the rumors last month were true: Six thousand centrifuges will continue to spin, which is supposedly a great victory for the U.S. since it would mean — assuming Iran isn’t covertly operating even more centrifuges under the UN’s nose — that Iran would need a solid year to “break out” and refine enough uranium to power a nuclear bomb. Which means Barack Obama would have a year to prepare and execute a U.S. attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities to stop them.Oh, minor footnote: Barack Obama’s never going to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities. Ever. And both sides understand that.

[Six thousand is] less than the 10,000 such machines Tehran now runs, yet substantially more than the 500 to 1,500 that Washington originally wanted as a ceiling. Only a year ago, U.S. officials floated 4,000 as a possible compromise…
It’s unclear how complete the draft agreement is. Iran’s deeply buried underground enrichment plant remains a problem, officials said, with Washington demanding the facility be repurposed and Tehran insisting it be able to run hundreds of centrifuges there. Iran says it wants to use the machines for scientific research; the Americans fear they could be quickly retooled for enrichment…
Any March framework agreement is unlikely to constrain Iran’s missile program, which the United States believes may ultimately be aimed at creating delivery systems for nuclear warheads. Diplomats say that as the talks move to deadline, the Iranians continue to insist that missile curbs are not up for discussion…
After the deal expires [in 15-20 years], Iran could theoretically ramp up enrichment to whatever level or volume it wants.

So Iran gets to keep enriching, maybe gets to keep using its heavily fortified Fordow facility, gets to keep perfecting its ICBMs while all of this is happening, and then is free to get crazy with the nuclear cheez whiz in 15 years — and amid all this, a variety of American and international sanctions would be gradually relaxed. In return for all that, the U.S. gets a handful of magic beans. Pet the Gatestone Institute, even the French — the French! — think Obama’s a sucker who’s unwittingly kickstarting a nuclear panic among the Middle East’s Sunni powers. The same guy who’s spent years talking up “nuclear zero” may end up leaving a legacy of Islamic states arming themselves to the teeth with civilization-destroying bombs:

[French Foreign Minister Laurent] Fabius himself, in a meeting last week, made extremely clear his deep distrust (“contempt, really,” one MP says) of both John Kerry and Barack Obama. Another of the group quotes Fabius as saying: “The United States was really ready to sign just about anything with the Iranians,” before explaining that he himself had sent out, mid-February, a number of French ‘counter-proposals’ to the State Department and White House, in order to prevent an agreement too imbalanced in favor of Iran…
French diplomats are no angels, and they haven’t suddenly turned 180 degrees from their usual attitude of reflexive dislike toward Israel. They worry, however, that if Iran gets nuclear weapons, every other local Middle East power will want them. Among their worst nightmares is a situation in which Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia join the Dr. Strangelove club. French diplomats may not like Israel, but they do not believe Israelis would use a nuclear device except in a truly Armageddon situation for Israel. As for Egypt, Saudi Arabia or Turkey going nuclear, however, they see terrifying possibilities: irresponsible leaders, or some ISIS-type terrorist outfit, could actually use them. In other words, even if they would never express it as clearly as that, they see Israelis as “like us,” but others potentially as madmen.

I said most of what I had to say about this in this post but let me reemphasize an obvious point: All this is, really, is a punt. Obama’s stuck between two unpalatable options, bombing Iran and starting (or escalating) a hot war across at least three countries in the region, namely, Iran, Iraq, and Syria, or doing nothing and being known to history as the Man Who Let Iran Get the Bomb. A 15-year deal with sunset provisions is as explicit an attempt as you can get to push the ultimate disposition of Iran’s nuke program onto some future president. Maybe the mullahs will be deposed by then and the problem will solve itself (although it’s naive to think even a friendlier regime in Tehran will be willing to capitulate on enrichment). Maybe the U.S. will have developed new weapons by then, cyber or otherwise, that will permit a more effective attack on Iran’s facilities than we’re capable of right now. Maybe the Israelis will figure something out. Or maybe the status quo will hold, more or less, and President Hillary or President Jeb or whoever will have to make the sort of tough decision that Obama’s incapable of making. Whatever the answer, it won’t be his problem anymore. Unless of course Iran violates the agreement before January 2017. And why would they do that and risk alienating O when he’s busy reorienting America’s entire Middle East policy towards detente with the Shiite menace?
Two other points here. One: After all the Democratic screeching about Tom Cotton’s unprecedented, historic, near-treasonous Logan-Act-smashing letter to Iran, it did squat to disrupt the deal. And that was predictable, of course, since Cotton’s letter said nothing that Iran didn’t already know. It was cheap left-wing demagoguery from the word go, designed to bolster a guy whose committed the sort of sins against separation of powers that would have liberals demanding impeachment if a Republican had committed them. Take nothing these people say seriously. Two: All lefty defenses of doing a deal with Iran boil down to “the mullahs are rational.” Even if the worst occurs and they build a bomb on the sly — a prospect Obama’s Democratic supporters are clearly already preparing for rhetorically — it’s not a huge deal because Iran’s rulers haven’t made any suicidal moves to date. They didn’t fight to the bitter end against Saddam in the 80s, they preferred Shiite proxies and arms shipments to direct battlefield confrontation with the U.S. in Iraq — they know their limitations, so they won’t do anything dramatic with Israel knowing the scale of nuclear retaliation that awaits. The problem with that defense is that it assumes that things can’t get worse in Iran; the current regime is the craziest Iran is capable of, supposedly, and since they’re kinda sorta rational, that means there’s no worst-case scenario. Rule one of Middle Eastern regime change, though, is that things can always get worse (and usually do). In fact, the left’s criticism of Cotton’s letter tacitly acknowledges it: Cotton’s letter allowed “hardline” opponents of the nuclear deal in Iran’s parliament to proclaim that the negotiations were doomed and shouldn’t continue. What happens if Khamenei dies and one of those “hardliners” ascends the throne? Lefties and righties alike recognize what a nuclear clusterfark it would be if Pakistan’s leadership was deposed by something more Taliban-esque. We all understand it’d be a terrible idea to let the Saudi royals have the bomb knowing what’s waiting in the wings to replace them. What if something similar happened in Iran, with the fanatics di tutti fanatics within the regime suddenly inheriting a supply of highly enriched uranium? Why does Iran get such a weird benefit of the doubt as to its enduring stability and rationality?
Update: Ah, here’s a nice catch by Jeff Dunetz. If Iran’s nuclear production is all about supplying power plants, why on earth would they settle for only a few thousand centrifuges but insist on more than 4,000, per the AP excerpt above? Your answer:

If you are going to have a nuclear weapons program, 5,000 is pretty much the number you need,” [former CIA deputy director Mike] Morell, now a CBS analyst, said on Charlie Rose. “If you have a power program, you need a lot more. By limiting them to a small number of centrifuges, we are limiting them to the number you need for a weapon.”

Iranian Horn Enhances More Uranium (Daniel 8)

Tehran Nuclear Chief: Iran “Enhancing” Its Nuclear Program, Uranium Enrichment Process
Iran has been “enhancing” its nuclear program and bolstering its uranium enrichment capability, Iran’s atomic energy chief told a group of the country’s ambassadors and envoys in Tehran on Saturday.

“We are enhancing the industrial section of Iran’s nuclear activities technologically with modern systems and machines,” said Ali Akbar Salehi, head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, according to Fars news agency. He further asserted that the quality of the country’s process of uranium enrichment was improving, Tehran Times reported.

Salehi added that Iran’s nuclear program was on the “right path” and was “compatible with the strategic plans of the country,” according to the IRNA state news agency. He also said that Iran is beginning to sell its heavy water on the open market.

Salehi’s remarks recall a concern raised last year by Mark Dubowitz and Reuel Marc Gerecht of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, who warned that details leaked about the nuclear deal suggested that “eventually the regime could legally develop an industrial-size enrichment program, reducing its bomb breakout time to days and increasing the risk of uranium diversion to covert sites.” Similarly, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned in his speech before Congress last year that the deal “creates an even greater danger that Iran could get to the bomb by keeping the deal.”
President Barack Obama acknowledged last April that given the nuclear advances that Iran could achieve over the course of the deal, Iran’s nuclear “breakout times would have shrunk almost down to zero” by the time that the accord expires.

Iran Horn Continues To Make Enriched Uranium

Iran says it is ‘enhancing’ nuclear activities, including uranium enrichment

Tehran nuclear chief Salehi hails technological progress, says Iran establishing itself as an exporter of nuclear products

By TIMES OF ISRAEL STAFF
May 14, 2016, 6:04 pm

Iran is enhancing its nuclear activities, and has improved its capacity to enrich uranium, Iran’s nuclear chief told a gathering of his country’s diplomats in Tehran on Saturday.

“We are enhancing the industrial section of Iran’s nuclear activities technologically with modern systems and machines,” said Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran who was a key figure in the negotiation of last year’s nuclear deal between Iran and the US-led P5+1 world powers.

Salehi spoke of advances in enrichment capability, asserting that the quality of process of uranium enrichment in Iran is also progressing, according to the Tehran Times.

Iran’s IRNA state news agency reported: “Salehi said that Iran’s nuclear program is on the right path naturally and compatible with the strategic plans of the country in a transparent way based on international factors.”

He also told the envoys, at a conference that focused on the nuclear deal, that Iran is establishing itself as an exporter of nuclear products, including heavy water. “We have improved the country’s situation in the field of the civilian nuclear energy,” Salehi said, according to Iran’s Fars news agency.
Iran is enhancing its nuclear activities, and has improved its capacity to enrich uranium, Iran’s nuclear chief told a gathering of his country’s diplomats in Tehran on Saturday.

“We are enhancing the industrial section of Iran’s nuclear activities technologically with modern systems and machines,” said Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran who was a key figure in the negotiation of last year’s nuclear deal between Iran and the US-led P5+1 world powers.

Salehi spoke of advances in enrichment capability, asserting that the quality of process of uranium enrichment in Iran is also progressing, according to the Tehran Times.

Iran’s IRNA state news agency reported: “Salehi said that Iran’s nuclear program is on the right path naturally and compatible with the strategic plans of the country in a transparent way based on international factors.”

He also told the envoys, at a conference that focused on the nuclear deal, that Iran is establishing itself as an exporter of nuclear products, including heavy water. “We have improved the country’s situation in the field of the civilian nuclear energy,” Salehi said, according to Iran’s Fars news agency.
Iran is enhancing its nuclear activities, and has improved its capacity to enrich uranium, Iran’s nuclear chief told a gathering of his country’s diplomats in Tehran on Saturday.

“We are enhancing the industrial section of Iran’s nuclear activities technologically with modern systems and machines,” said Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran who was a key figure in the negotiation of last year’s nuclear deal between Iran and the US-led P5+1 world powers.

Salehi spoke of advances in enrichment capability, asserting that the quality of process of uranium enrichment in Iran is also progressing, according to the Tehran Times.
Iran’s IRNA state news agency reported: “Salehi said that Iran’s nuclear program is on the right path naturally and compatible with the strategic plans of the country in a transparent way based on international factors.”
He also told the envoys, at a conference that focused on the nuclear deal, that Iran is establishing itself as an exporter of nuclear products, including heavy water. “We have improved the country’s situation in the field of the civilian nuclear energy,” Salehi said, according to Iran’s Fars news agency.
Salehi said earlier this week that Iran was negotiating with Russia to sell 40 tons of its excess heavy water.

The nuclear deal was designed to freeze and inspect Iran’s rogue nuclear program, in return for sanctions relief for the Tehran regime. Critics, notably including Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, have warned that, far from blocking Iran’s path to the bomb, it paves the way to an Iranian nuclear arsenal.

Even as the deal is being implemented, Iran’s leaders have kept up a barrage of aggressive rhetoric against the United States and Israel. Earlier this month, for instance, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said that the United States is the Middle East’s main enemy, with the “Zionist regime” a close second.

Speaking at a meeting in Tehran with the head of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group, Khamenei said that looking at the turmoil in the region in a “macro” sense, the US was clearly to blame, with Israel following closely behind.

Iran has also been testing ballistic missiles. In March, it tested what it said were missiles with a 2,000-kilometer range, capable of reaching Israel, inscribed with the words, “Israel must be wiped out.”

The Obama administration, which championed the Iran deal, has been under fire at home in recent days after a top presidential adviser, Ben Rhodes, reportedly told the New York Times he created an “echo chamber” of supportive experts in an effort to persuade lawmakers to back the deal. The article also claims Obama misrepresented the timeline of the negotiations in an effort to create a story line that bolstered the administration’s case.
AP contributed to this story.

Obama Needs To Use Red Mark Erasers (Eze 17)

 

Team Obama just crossed its own nuclear red line

By Post Editorial Board
June 19, 2015 | 7:42pm

Yet another Obama red line has been crossed. Only this time, Team Obama are the ones who crossed it.

Secretary of State John Kerry this week threw in the towel on a requirement that he long called essential to any nuke agreement with Iran: requiring Tehran to account for all of its past nuclear work.

Never mind, he now says: “We’re not fixated on Iran specifically accounting for what they did at one point in time or another.”

“We have absolute knowledge with respect to the certain military activities they were engaged in,” he added.

No, we don’t — as everyone who’s worked on the issue will tell you. They’ll also tell you that, absent that accounting, it’ll be impossible to verify if Iran is complying with any deal.

Kerry’s statement is a 180 from what he said just weeks ago. Asked in April about the insistence that Iran disclose its past military-related nuclear activity, he replied: “They have to do it. It will be done. If there’s going to be a deal, it will be done.”

Iran’s nuke program long predates 2003, when the world first learned of it.

If we don’t know what they were doing then, there’s no way to tell if they’ve stopped. As former CIA Director Michael Hayden said, Kerry is “pretending we have perfect knowledge about something that was an incredibly tough intelligence target when I was director, and I see nothing that has made it any easier.”

Little wonder, then, that the State Department insists Kerry’s comments don’t reflect “any kind of concession or change in policy.”

For months, Kerry and President Obama promised the country — and skeptics in Congress — that they wouldn’t take a deal that didn’t include full Iranian disclosure. Now, plainly, Tehran’s refusing to go along — yet our leaders so want some deal that they’ll swallow it, and then lie.

The question is, are key leaders on Capitol Hill — we’re talking to you, Sen. Chuck Schumer — going to pretend they buy the lie?

Giving More Concessions To Iran (Eze 17)

  


Negotiators may let Iran slide on past nuclear work

BY: Charles Hoskinson June 12, 2015 | 12:52 pm

The Obama administration and its international negotiating partners appear willing to sign a nuclear deal with Iran that would not require Tehran to come clean on possible past work to develop a nuclear weapon, which experts have called crucial to ensuring any agreement can be verified.

The Associated Press, citing Western and U.S. officials, reported Thursday that members of the P5+1 group — the U.S., U.K., France, Germany, Russia and China — were prepared to accept a deal that does not immediately answer questions about Iran’s past nuclear weapons program, in spite of the administration’s insistence that those questions must be resolved in any agreement.

As negotiators race to meet a July 1 deadline, this apparent concession will likely cause problems for the administration in Congress, where lawmakers have heard months of testimony from neutral experts saying this is a crucial element in verifying under any agreement that Iran’s nuclear program remains peaceful.

Once an agreement is signed, lawmakers will have 30 days to review it and decide whether to reject it. Obama can veto any rejection. The ability to verify a deal has been a major bipartisan concern, and may sway the votes of Democrats in whose hands the fate of any agreement will ultimately rest.

Iran is required by U.N. Security Council resolutions to detail any past secret work on nuclear weapons, which is believed to have ended more than a decade ago. But the International Atomic Energy Agency has said Tehran has not complied with that requirement.

Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey, who has emerged as the leading Democratic critic of the deal, noted the lack of progress in a floor speech Thursday.

“We can’t trust Iran to abide by its agreements or to abide by United Nations resolutions even when they are in the midst of negotiations, when you think they’d be behaving the best,” he said. “Why do we think we can trust them if they are violating U.N. Security Council resolutions, which is the world, not the U.S., not even the P5+1, but the world, telling them ‘you can’t do these things?'”

“Iran…needs to be held responsible for its commitments — forget about its word — its commitments. There can be no slippage, no delays, no obfuscation.”

Any concession on this issue may also cause a split in the negotiating group, most notably with France, which has taken a hard line on this issue. Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said May 27 that it would be a deal-breaker if Iran denies access to military sites, backing up the IAEA’s interpretation of Iran’s obligations. He was reacting to comments a week earlier by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, that ruled out such access.

Obama In The Dark Again (Daniel 8:4)

Surprise: Iran’s supply of enriched uranium has grown 20% since last year despite Obama’s claim that it was “frozen”

posted at 11:21 am on June 2, 2015 by Allahpundit

“Western officials and experts cannot quite figure out why,” notes the Times, despite the fact that UN inspectors have had “almost daily access” to Iranian nuclear facilities. These are the same inspectors we’ll be relying on to detect whether Iran’s cheating once the final deal is in effect. If they can’t tell why a stash of nuclear fuel right under their noses is growing, what don’t they know about projects that Iran has worked harder to conceal?

As a preface to the news, here’s a suddenly memorable quote from this year’s State of the Union: “Our diplomacy is at work with respect to Iran, where, for the first time in a decade, we’ve halted the progress of its nuclear program and reduced its stockpile of nuclear material.” Over to you, NYT:

With only one month left before a deadline to complete a nuclear deal with Iran, international inspectors have reported that Tehran’s stockpile of nuclear fuel increased about 20 percent over the last 18 months of negotiations, partially undercutting the Obama administration’s contention that the Iranian program had been “frozen” during that period…
The 2013 plan for capping the stockpile relied on Iran’s stated plan to build a “conversion plant” at its sprawling nuclear complex at Isfahan. The plant was intended to turn newly enriched uranium into oxide powder, the first step toward making reactor fuel rods. In other words, while the stockpile would not be reduced, it also should not have grown…
What remains unknown is the cause of the bottleneck at the new plant: technical problems, Iranian foot-dragging, or some combination of the two. The Institute for Science and International Security, a Washington research group, wrote in an analysis on Friday that Iranian officials say the plant’s final stage “did not work properly,” prompting the delay…
Presiding over the plant’s opening last August, Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, said Iran had successfully overcome industrial sabotage, a long rumored way the West has sought to slow Tehran’s nuclear program.

Says Andrew Stiles, if today’s story only “partially” undercuts Obama’s claims, what would have to happen to totally undercut it?

Two theories, then. One: Iran’s deliberately building up its uranium stockpile to spook the west and make them more amenable to concessions when the final deal is struck this month. Two: Iran’s trying to get rid of some of its uranium by converting it into nuclear fuel rods, which are harmless for bomb-making purposes — but something’s stopping them, possibly some sort of western Stuxnet-style sabotage. Except, of course, it’d be nuts for the west to prevent Iran from reducing its supply of potential bomb material; the sabotage nonsense being spouted is either propaganda designed to disguise Iran’s own technical incompetence or a convenient cover story for the fact that they’re building up their uranium supply deliberately. And the more it builds, the harder it gets for Obama to sell this final-deal abortion back home in the U.S. He’ll still get it through Congress, of course — Bob Corker’s sellout Senate bill, which allows any deal to be implemented so long as just one-third of the chamber supports it, will see to that. But the more it looks like Iran’s already cheating by making a liar of Obama on his “we stopped the program!” claims, the more politically painful making this deal will be for O among American voters. I hope that humiliation is worth it to Iran: By making a joke out of O, they’re also making it harder for Hillary to get elected next year, and Hillary’s far more likely than any Republican except Rand Paul to keep a dubious agreement with Iran intact.

The obvious question now: If their uranium stockpile is growing because there really is some innocent technical glitch at the “conversion plant,” why doesn’t Iran make a goodwill gesture to its western negotiation partners by either secretly freezing uranium enrichment until the glitch is resolved or quietly handing over the new uranium that they’re enriching to the UN for safekeeping somewhere inside the country? They wouldn’t want to do either of those things publicly for fear of losing face among the Iranian public but they could presumably do both surreptitiously, to reassure western powers until the conversion plant is functioning properly. How come they haven’t?

While you mull that, skip to 0:55 for Obama’s answer to an Israeli reporter when asked why a military solution wouldn’t be more likely to stop Iran’s program. That won’t work now, says O; all it would do is temporarily set back Iran’s program. Which is funny, because that’s all Obama’s nuclear deal would do too. Ten years from now, Iran can go right back to cranking out enriched uranium with the west’s blessing, albeit with far more efficient centrifuges than they’re using now. And really, if O’s going to nudge Israel that a military attack won’t work at this point, shouldn’t he acknowledge that it’s partly his own administration’s fault that that’s true? His deputies aren’t even coy about it. They’ll tell you flat out, when they’re not busy mocking Netanyahu as a “chickensh*t” for not bombing Iran when he had the chance.

Iran’s Nuclear Stockpile Continues To Grow (Dan 8:4)

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Iran’s Nuclear Stockpile Grows, Complicating Negotiations
By DAVID E. SANGER and WILLIAM J. BROADJUNE 1, 2015

WASHINGTON — With only one month left before a deadline to complete a nuclear deal with Iran, international inspectors have reported that Tehran’s stockpile of nuclear fuel increased about 20 percent over the last 18 months of negotiations, partially undercutting the Obama administration’s contention that the Iranian program had been “frozen” during that period.

But Western officials and experts cannot quite figure out why. One possibility is that Iran has run into technical problems that have kept it from converting some of its enriched uranium into fuel rods for reactors, which would make the material essentially unusable for weapons. Another is that it is increasing its stockpile to give it an edge if the negotiations fail.

The extent to which Iran’s stockpile has increased was documented in a report issued Friday by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations organization that monitors compliance with nuclear treaties. The agency’s inspectors, who have had almost daily access to most of Iran’s nuclear production facilities, reported finding no evidence that Iran was racing toward a nuclear weapon, and said Tehran had halted work on facilities that could have given it bomb-making capabilities.

Since atomic negotiations began a year and a half ago, Iran has slowly increased the size of its uranium stockpile, which can fuel either reactors or bombs.

The overall increase in Iran’s stockpile poses a major diplomatic and political challenge for President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry, who flew back to the United States from Geneva on Monday for treatment of a broken leg he suffered in a bicycling accident, as they enter a 30-day push to try to complete an agreement by the end of June. In essence, the administration will have to convince Congress and America’s allies that Iran will shrink its stockpile by 96 percent in a matter of months after a deal is signed, even while it continues to produce new material and has demonstrated little success in reducing its current stockpile.

“From the U.S. perspective, it’s obviously less than ideal,” said Richard M. Nephew, an Iran specialist at Columbia University, who worked at the White House and State Department. Mr. Nephew said the enlarged stockpile was not a deal breaker because Iran could find a way of solving the problem, especially if it was offered sanctions relief.

A major element of the forthcoming deal, if it is completed, permits Iran to maintain a stockpile of only 300 kilograms, or about 660 pounds, of nuclear fuel, less than would be needed to make a single weapon.

That means Iran, which insists its nuclear program is for civilian purposes, would have to rid itself of more than nine tons of its stockpile in a matter of months. One easy solution would be to ship the fuel out of the country, but that is a politically fraught topic for the Iranians — and one that their deputy negotiator, Abbas Araqchi, ruled out in March.

“There is no question of sending the stocks abroad,” Mr. Araqchi said at the time. A State Department statement released a few days later that outlined the preliminary agreement reached at a marathon session in Lausanne, Switzerland, was silent on the question of how the reduction would be realized.

Administration officials said nothing publicly about the atomic energy agency’s report. But several officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said that the Iranians understood that under a final agreement they would commit to giving up almost all of their fuel and maintaining a small stockpile for 15 years.

“How are they going to do it?” one senior American official said recently when asked about the negotiations, details of which Mr. Kerry and his team are trying to keep confidential. “We’re not certain. It’s their problem, not ours. But it’s a problem.”

Nonetheless, officials say they expect the radical reduction of Iran’s stockpile to happen in the opening months of any agreement, either by shipping it out of the country or changing it into a form that would make it impossible to re-enrich and use as a weapon.

Mr. Kerry met with his Iranian counterpart, Mohammad Javad Zarif, in Geneva on Saturday to discuss how the stockpile would be destroyed and other impediments to a final deal. Mr. Kerry was joined at the talks by Energy Secretary Ernest J. Moniz, who will have to certify to Congress that the deal ensures that Iran will remain at least a year away from being able to produce a weapon’s worth of bomb fuel over the next decade, a complex calculation in which the size of Iran’s stockpile is a major factor.

Other elements of Iran’s program, however, have been frozen or rolled back. Construction has stopped on a major plutonium reactor, and it is undergoing a redesign to make it less threatening. And while Iran has installed about 20,000 centrifuges at its enrichment plants, roughly half are idle. Of the fuel that the United States worries about most — because it was enriched to a level a short step away from bomb-grade — half has been diluted, and the rest is being turned into reactor fuel.

There is little doubt that in the absence of the interim accord, called the “Joint Plan of Action,” Iran would have made even greater strides. But the numbers published Friday by the atomic energy agency show that Iran has continued to enrich uranium aggressively, even though it knew that it was not meeting its goals of converting its stockpile into reactor rods.

The question is: How much of the increased stockpile was done for political reasons, and how much is because adding to the stockpile has proved easier than eliminating it?

The 2013 plan for capping the stockpile relied on Iran’s stated plan to build a “conversion plant” at its sprawling nuclear complex at Isfahan. The plant was intended to turn newly enriched uranium into oxide powder, the first step toward making reactor fuel rods. In other words, while the stockpile would not be reduced, it also should not have grown.

As the Bipartisan Policy Center, a research group in Washington, said in February, “Iran has failed” to do the conversion. As a result, it added, Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium, compared with when the preliminary accord went into effect, was growing “significantly larger.”

Key developments since the United States, its negotiating partners and Iran agreed to a nuclear framework in April.
 
Saudi Arabia said it would match Iran’s nuclear capability.
  Iran’s supreme leader ruled out inspection of military sites and interviews with scientists.
  France said such inspections were essential for a deal.
  Wendy R. Sherman, the chief United States negotiator with Iran, said she planned to step down after the June 30 deadline.
  Iran began the trial of a Washington Post correspondent, Jason Rezaian, on espionage charges, perhaps as leverage in negotiations.

(A small part of the increase came from Iran’s compliance with another part of the agreement, under which it took part of its small stockpile of medium-enriched fuel, the one closest to bomb grade, and converted it to low-enriched fuel, lengthening the timeline necessary to use it for a weapon.)

What remains unknown is the cause of the bottleneck at the new plant: technical problems, Iranian foot-dragging, or some combination of the two. The Institute for Science and International Security, a Washington research group, wrote in an analysis on Friday that Iranian officials say the plant’s final stage “did not work properly,” prompting the delay.

The Iranians themselves tell a more complicated story.

Presiding over the plant’s opening last August, Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, said Iran had successfully overcome industrial sabotage, a long rumored way the West has sought to slow Tehran’s nuclear program.

Mr. Obama must decide when to lift the harshest of the sanctions against Iran. If he lifts the sanctions, even partially, before Iran has destroyed or shipped all but the last small amount of uranium, he might lose leverage in ensuring that Iran complies with the rest of its pledge.

On the other hand, waiting too long risks unraveling a deal, especially if ordinary Iranians see no economic benefits from cooperation.

For his part, Mr. Obama seems focused on the long-term question: Can he prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon for the remainder of his term and that of his successor?

With the stockpiles and the number of operating centrifuges reduced, “we know that even if they wanted to cheat, we would have at least a year, which is about three times longer than we’d have right now,” to react, Mr. Obama told Thomas L. Friedman, a columnist for The New York Times, in April, “and we would have insights into their programs that we’ve never had before.”

David E. Sanger reported from Washington, and William J. Broad from New York.

Russia Supplying Iranian Nuclear Horn (Dan 7)

Russian Company Wants To Build More Nuclear Plants In Iran

By Sounak Mukhopadhyay
on May 27 2015 12:22 PM EDT

Sergei Kiriyenko (front right), head of the Russian state nuclear monopoly Rosatom, and Ali Akbar Salehi (left) head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, attend a signing ceremony in Moscow, Nov. 11, 2014. Reuters/Maxim Shemetov

Russia is likely to build two more nuclear power plants in Iran. The indication comes from a senior Rosatom official.

Nikolai Spassky, Rosatom’s deputy director general for international affairs, said that his country was ready to sign agreements with Iran to build two more nuclear plants in the Islamic republic. The official from Russia’s State Corporation on Atomic Energy said that the company was ready to build the second and the third nuclear power plants in Iran.

Spassky had a meeting with Mehdi Sanaei, Iran’s ambassador to Russia. He said his company would want to build the plants in Bushehr. Russia already has a nuclear plant in the southern port city in Iraq.

Iran’s Press TV reported that Spassky was hopeful about a potential nuclear deal between Iran and six world powers. He hoped that an agreement would be finalized before a June deadline.

Russia’s business relations with Iran seem to be growing: It has given six Iranian food companies permission to export their products to Russia. “We gave permission for the delivery of food products from six Iranian companies: four dairy producers, and two poultry producers,” Yulia Melano, press secretary for Russia’s Federal Veterinary and Phytosanitary Inspection Service, told Business Insider. “Deliveries can begin only after the completion of an additional set of requirements, which will guarantee complete safety.”

Financial Times reported that Russia had expressed uncertainty about delivering high-end defense missiles in the future. Yevgeny Lukyanov, deputy head of Russia’s Security Council, said that it was still not the right time to make such deliveries. His comments came Tuesday while Western powers, including the United States, have been critical about Russia’s decision to clear the missile deal. According to some, Russia’s lenient attitude toward Iran may delay the process of finalizing the nuclear agreement.

How Iran Can Cheat The Nuclear Deal (Dan 8)

Iran: The Back Door to Enrichment

 

By Stephen Bryen & Shoshana Bryen

It would seem that Iran holds the cards in the nuclear negotiation with the P5+1, primarily because the U.S. is the overeager suitor.  The Framework agreement, the basis for the final deal, does not prevent Iran from designing nuclear warheads or building delivery systems.  There is also increasing evidence that the language has been configured so Iran could also either enrich uranium or produce plutonium for weapons – even without cheating.  But although the deal appears heavily weighted toward Iranian nuclear interests, the mullahs appear convinced they need a back as well as a front door.

So cheat they do.

Earlier this year, the U.N. reported that the government of the Czech Republic had stopped the sale of a large number of axial flow compressors sought by the Iranian government through an intermediary using phony documents.  The sale, estimated to be worth $61 million, was a blatant violation of U.N. sanctions on Iran.  One Czech source said the intermediary claimed that Iran wanted the compressors to move natural gas; they can also enrich uranium.

Iran is known to be using Zippe-type cascades of gas centrifuges for enrichment, a process that does not require compressors. Iran was not known to be using gas diffusion and Helikon ASP, two processes that do require compressors.  Gas diffusion is one of the oldest known methods for uranium extraction; however, its use is declining because it requires large amounts of energy and has relatively low output.  Helikon, enrichment using uranium hexafluoride, consumes about the same amount of energy but is somewhat more efficient and is easy to conceal.  On the other hand, Helikon is highly caustic and dangerous.  In particular, if “hex” gas comes in contact with water or water vapor, corrosive hydrogen fluoride will result.  Interestingly, the Czech compressors were optimized for caustic environments.

There are three reasons every country known to have pursued nuclear weapons development has tried concurrent solutions.  The first – practical – reason is that should a problem arise at any point in the chain, the program could be delayed.  In the famous race between the United States and Germany during World War II, the U.S. invested massively in different solutions for fear the Germans might get the bomb first and change the outcome of the war.  Even after Germany surrendered, there was a rush to collect enough uranium and plutonium to attack Japan before the U.S. was obliged to initiate a massive invasion of the Japanese mainland.

Iran has to contend with the United States and Israel, one an actual and one a presumed nuclear power.  With proven nuclear weapons, the calculus changes, and Iran’s push for regional control improves dramatically.  Already behind, the first reason can help ensure that they can make up 
ground.

The second reason is to protect the nuclear infrastructure from a determined enemy.  There have been a number of attacks on Iranian installations, including an explosion in November 2011 at the Shahid Modarres missile base, which satellite imagery confirmed destroyed large parts of the base, and what appears to have been a large explosion at Parchin in October 2014, where nuclear warhead testing was said to be underway.  There have been bombings and assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists.  There have been virtual attacks designed to take out Iran’s gas centrifuges, including the Stuxnet worm, alleged to have been a joint U.S.-Israel operation.  Thus, a nuclear “wannabe” will want multiple locations for weapons development and, if possible, redundancy in case any attack is successful.

The third reason is secrecy and the risk that operations might be discovered.  The Manhattan Project, despite its massive industrial scale, was secret, as was the British Tube Alloys Program – except for the Soviet spies.

What we know about in Iran is what the Iranians have been willing to say – officially or otherwise – or what spy agencies and surveillance have been able to show.  But it is highly unlikely that the entire Iranian nuclear infrastructure is completely known.  Indeed, the almost-shipment of axial flow compressors strongly suggests there is a lot more going on than meets the eye.  Add to this reports that Iran is working on missile warhead testing and, according to the London Guardian, is developing two-point implosion bombs, it follows that Iran has a complex and sophisticated program much of which remains hidden.

It is widely reported that Iran has received significant help from Russia, China, North Korea, and Pakistan and tons of vital supplies from Western Europe and even the United States, making the scope of their program clearer. Just this year, the British government reported to the U.N. that Iran maintains a large clandestine technology acquisition operation funneling hardware and technology to Iran’s bomb program.  There is tantalizing evidence that Iran got help from South Africa. 

South Africa calls its uranium enrichment facility “Valindaba,” which is Zulu, meaning “we don’t talk about this at all.”  The nuclear weapons program and the plant at Valindaba were closed down, but South Africa retains the technology it developed.  Initially supplied by Germany, the South Africans say they improved the uranium enrichment process known as ASP into the Helikon vortex separation system.  From this system, South Africa produced at least eight working atomic bombs and was seeking to develop or acquire technology to produce smaller warheads that could be mounted on their RSA-2 multi-stage missiles, which were knock-offs of Israel’s Jericho II missile.  Late last year, South Africa was thinking of restarting Valindaba for uranium enrichment. 
Strong confirmation of South African-Iranian cooperation comes from intelligence documents prepared by South Africa’s National Intelligence Agency and leaked to Al Jazeera.  In the documents, the NIA comments in depth on how Iran had penetrated South Africa at multiple levels and started cooperation on nuclear technology, including a reported meeting between Hassan Rouhani, then-head of the Supreme National Security Council of Iran and now Iran’s president, and South African president Thabo Mbeki.  Rouhani asked the South African government to assist Iran with its nuclear program.  The press reported that South Africa responded in part by offering uranium oxide that could be converted into uranium hexafluoride, but the Iranians also wanted technology.  What they might have gotten is unclear, but Helikon know-how would certainly been on the list of possibilities.  Helikon vortex separation system modules each require two axial flow compressors. 
Was that the objective of trying to bring compressors illegally to Iran from the Czech Republic?
Naturally, the State Department tried to downplay the transfer.  If Iran was well along on uranium enrichment systems other than those already known – in other words, if Iran was proven to be cheating even before the Framework becomes a deal – the whole American-led house of cards could collapse. 

The Obama administration and the P5+1 claim to be seeking to restrict uranium enrichment, but there is growing evidence that loopholes in the deal make it possible for Iran to continue its main programs.  Thus far, Iran’s “red lines” are the ability to continue enriching uranium and putting military installations, other than those already identified in the deal, off limits to inspectors.  That leaves a great many military sites off limits – including, perhaps, one where the Czech compressors would have been housed had the ruse been successful.

Iran is working on atomic weapons and advanced implosion technology so it can make a small enough weapon to fit on its North Korean-supplied ballistic missiles.  Because the P5+1 Framework agreement covers only a small and exposed part of Iran’s nuclear weapons program, and cannot account for that we do not know, Iran can be expected to emerge as a nuclear power at any time.

Trying To Put The Genie Back In The Bottle (Dan 8:3)

World powers look for rigid restrictions on Iran’s centrifuge development in talks

Senior German official tells Haaretz that ‘R&D is a big deal,’ so that breakout time for bomb isn’t too quick.

By Barak Ravid

Published 06:00 05.05.15

 

The six world powers negotiating a nuclear deal with Iran want the agreement to include rigid restrictions on Iran’s research and development work on advanced centrifuges, both during the agreement’s first 10 years and for some years thereafter, a senior German official familiar with the talks told Haaretz.

 

“R&D is a big deal,” said the official, who asked to remain anonymous due to the diplomatic sensitivity of the negotiations. “The final deal must include clear restrictions on R&D, so that enrichment capacity does not go through the roof.”

The official said the German government is in regular contact with its Israeli counterpart over the nuclear negotiations, at the level of both experts and politicians. National Security Adviser Yossi Cohen will arrive in Berlin today for talks, with Iran top of the list.

The issue of research and development is one of Israel’s primary concerns about the emerging nuclear deal, which is supposed to be finalized by June 30. Iran’s research on advanced centrifuges could significantly shorten its breakout time – the time it would need to build a nuclear weapon if it decided to eject UN inspectors and start enriching uranium at full speed, to the necessary level of 90 percent.

Currently, Iran’s breakout time is about two to three months. Under the emerging deal between Iran and the P5+1, its breakout time is supposed to be at least a year for the next 10 years.

Most of Iran’s centrifuges are older models, though it has a few newer models that can enrich uranium three or four times faster. Under the emerging deal, Iran would be able to use only its older centrifuges for the first 10 years.

But the Iranians are currently developing even more advanced models that could enrich uranium six to eight times faster than the older ones. Tehran is demanding that its R&D work on new centrifuges be allowed to continue unhindered. But the six powers fear that if R&D continues at the pace it has until now, then when the agreement expires, Iran will have highly advanced centrifuges that would let it enrich enough uranium for a bomb very quickly.

Two weeks ago, the nuclear negotiations resumed in Vienna for the first time since a framework deal was reached in Lausanne last month. Tehran had been furious over the fact sheet the White House distributed on the Lausanne framework. Consequently, the P5+1 had feared domestic pressure might cause the Iranians to renege on some of the understandings, the German official said. But that didn’t happen. “The last round of talks in Vienna was positive,” he said. “There were concerns that the Iranians might backtrack on some of the understandings from Lausanne, and they didn’t.

“Lausanne was a big step forward and we closed many gaps, and we have a good basis for the last steps toward a comprehensive agreement,” he added. “The feeling in Vienna was that everybody wants to get a deal by June 30, and that this is possible.”

But R&D isn’t the only unresolved issue. Another is what powers International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors will have. “Inspections and transparency are crucial,” the official said. “This must not be a deal that gives Iran the benefit of the doubt. That is why IAEA inspectors will get far-reaching access. However, the Iranians know that we have red lines and that we will not give up our principles just to get a deal,” he added. “The Iranians also need a deal, they must deliver to their people.”

Babylon Blind To Britain’s Warnings (Ezekiel 17)

 Britain tells UN Iran trying to buy nuclear technology
Iran is actively trying to buy nuclear technology through blacklisted companies, according to a confidential United Nations (UN) report, citing information from the British government.
The claims — which if true would violate UN sanctions — were made to a UN panel of experts just weeks after world powers reached a framework deal with Iran on curbing its nuclear program.
“The UK government informed the panel on the 20 April 2015 that it ‘is aware of an active Iranian nuclear procurement network which has been associated with Iran’s Centrifuge Technology Company (TESA) and Kalay Electric Company (KEC)’,” the report, seen by AFP, said.
“Given the late communication, the panel could not independently investigate the above information.”

The United Nations has slapped a series of sanctions on Iran over its failure to address international concerns about its nuclear program and suspicions that it could have military purposes.
KEC is on a UN list of blacklisted Iranian companies for its ties to the nuclear program.    



The report was presented to the Security Council’s Iran sanctions committee on April 21, just as negotiators from the P5+1 — Britain, China, France, Russia, the United States plus Germany – began work on finalizing the nuclear deal.

The panel noted that overall there had been few reported violations of UN sanctions.
“It might be linked, inter alia, to a decrease in the Islamic Republic of Iran’s prohibited activities and restraint on the part of member-states so as not to affect the negotiations process” for the nuclear deal, the report said.
World powers have set June 30 as the deadline for finalizing the agreement that would end one of the most vexing disputes in international diplomacy and could open the door to revamping relations with Iran.

NO Surprise: Iran Actively Procuring Uranium (Dan 8:3)

UN Is Warned of ‘Active Iranian Nuclear Procurement Network’

UNITED NATIONS — Apr 30, 2015, 3:49 PM ET

By CARA ANNA Associated Press

 

A general view of the Bushehr nuclear power plant, some 1,200 km (746 miles) south of Tehran October 26, 2010. REUTERS/IRNA/Mohammad Babaie

FILE – In this April 27, 2015 file photo, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif addresses the 2015 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) review conference, in the United Nations General Assembly. Britain has told a U.N. panel of experts that… View Full Caption The Associated Press

Britain has told a U.N. panel of experts that it is aware of an “active Iranian nuclear procurement network” linked to two Iranian companies, raising new concerns as world powers began Thursday to work out the details of a possible comprehensive agreement with Iran over its nuclear program.

Two U.N. sources confirmed Thursday that Britain’s warning on April 20 is included in a confidential report by the panel. The sources spoke on anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it.
The warning names two companies, “Iran’s Centrifuge Technology Company and Kalay Electric Company,” but it gives no details. Both companies are under U.S. sanctions, and Kalay Electric Company is on the U.N. sanctions list.

World powers, including the five permanent U.N. Security Council members plus Germany, are aiming for a deal on Iran’s nuclear program by June 30 with a goal of slowing any path the country might have toward developing a nuclear weapon.

Iran, which insists its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only, has not commented on the report by a panel of experts for the U.N. sanctions committee on Iran.

Iran is pushing for U.N. and other sanctions on it to be lifted as soon as a nuclear agreement with the United States and others is reached.

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf told reporters Thursday, “We remain concerned about their procurement, taken steps to designate entities for procurement in the recent past.” She said the U.S. has ongoing discussions with the U.N. about the issue.

The Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security has described the Tehran-based Kalay Electric Company as being “Iran’s primary centrifuge research and development site in the late 1990s and early 2000s, until Iran moved operations to the Natanz site in 2002.” It has said the company was private until being bought by the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran.

“The name ‘Kalaye Electric’ means ‘electric goods,’ implying that Iran kept the original name to help disguise the true purpose of the facility,” the institute has written. It added that when the International Atomic Energy Agency asked to inspect the site in 2003, Iran responded that it was a watch factory that also made a few centrifuge components.

The Treasury Department in 2011 said the Iran Centrifuge Technology Company “plays a crucial role in Iran’s uranium enrichment nuclear program. It is involved in the production of IR-1 centrifuges, the type of centrifuge Iran has used to enrich uranium and has used in facilities belonging to … Kalaye Electric Company.”

The news of the warning to the U.N. panel comes after Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif and Secretary of State John Kerry met Monday for the first time since a marathon negotiating session in Switzerland ended with the declaration of an understanding.

The challenge now lies in filling in the details. Zarif told an event in New York on Wednesday that “wording problems that pertain to all issues” still need to be worked out. He said Iran and world powers would meet Thursday to start bringing together the elements of a draft agreement, with meetings starting Monday in Europe to finalize all its elements.

One concern is whether Iran has declared everything it has in its nuclear program, especially on the military side.

In a speech on Monday to a global conference to review a landmark treaty on disarmament, the head of the IAEA, Yukiya Amano, warned that the IAEA “is not in a position 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.”

———

Associated Press writers Bradley Klapper in Washington and George Jahn in Vienna contributed.

Russia Enriching Even More Uranium (Dan 7:7)

Russia 1st to test 10Gen uranium enrichment centrifuges

Published time: April 27, 2015 11:37 Edited time: April 27, 2015 12:26

RIA Novosti / A. Solomonov

Rosatom, Russia’s nuclear agency, confirms scientists are testing 10th generation centrifuges. No other country even possesses 9th gen tech, putting Rosatom years ahead of the competition. “We’re on to 10 Gen,” announced Aleksandr Belousov, general director of Urals Integrated Electrochemical Plant (UIEP), a Rosatom subsidiary in Novouralsk, Sverdlovsk Region, in the Urals. “Scientists and engineers are solving technical issues, which is quite difficult. Any kind of new research and technological development is a venture undertaking, you can either succeed or fail… Any new machinery must be economically efficient. [10Gen] is being developed out of economic expediency, not for mere modernization. The more energy-intensive the machinery is, the more technical problems emerge,” Belousov said. A gas centrifuge uses principles of centrifugal force to perform radioisotope separation of gases, by accelerating molecules to such an extent that particles of different masses are physically separated within a rotating container. The centrifugal separation of isotopes is used for various purposes. First of all for production of low-enriched (up to 3-4 percent) uranium to be used as fuel at nuclear power plants. It also is used to produce weapons-grade, highly-enriched uranium (90 percent of U-235). Centrifuges are also needed to produce radioisotopes for medicine and various technical issues. Centrifuges are operated in cascades of hundreds and thousands units. Manufacturer supplies centrifuges in assemblies of 20 units in two rows, and at the factory they are placed on the columns in tiers, one above the other. Last week the second cascade unit of 9 Gen gas centrifuges has become operable at the UIEP, with the first 9 Gen unit introduced in late December 2013. Having two 9 Gen centrifuge cascades means that UIEP is the leader in the industry, making up to 48 percent of Russian radioisotope market and 20 percent of the global market, RIA Novosti reports.

Image from sdelanounas.ru

The 9 Gen centrifuges are four times more productive than 8 Gen centrifuges, which means a similar productivity pace should be applied to 10 Gen units, Belousov said. Development of nuclear enrichment centrifuges in the Soviet Union began in 1952. Over the time general dimensions of the machinery changed a little yet the productivity has augmented by 14 times, whereas operating costs have diminished by at least 10 times, aide to the UIEP head, Gennady Solovyov, said. The modern Russian centrifuge is a state-of-the-art component made of composite materials and special aluminum alloy. Its rotor spins with unbelievable speed of 1,000 rotations per second and can do it without a single stop for 30 years. Mechanical malfunctions are extremely rare, no more than 0.1 percent (one failure per 1,000 units) per year.

 

Russia’s TVEL Fuel Company (TENEX for operations abroad) is the largest operator of nuclear enrichment centrifuges and absolute leader of world’s radioisotope market, possessing about 30,000 separative work units (SWU), which is almost half of the world’s total 65,000 SWUs. Russian centrifuges are also the most advanced and have higher output capacity than SWUs from rival companies in France, US or Japan.

 

Starting from 2009 Russia is supplying 7 and 8 Gen centrifuges to China. The second-largest operator of uranium enrichment centrifuges after Rosatom is URENCO, a joint German, Dutch and UK enterprise operating 14,200 SWUs. Rosatom is heavily investing in nuclear enrichment at the UIEP. In 2014, the corporation allocated 7.5 billion rubles (nearly $150 million), whereas for 2015-2019 Rosatom plans to spend on the UIEP no less than 34 billion rubles (about $667 million).

How Many Centrifuges Does Iran Really Have? (Daniel 8:3)

Iran offer to cut centrifuges by a third led to progress in nuclear talks

Iranian centrifuges

By Barak Ravid

Western diplomats say Iran surprised world powers with a proposal offering, for the first time, concessions vis-à-vis the Islamic Republic’s centrifuge array and their enriched uranium stockpile.

An Iranian proposal to close down a third of its centrifuges and relinquish most of its low-enriched uranium has led to progress in talks with the six world powers in Geneva, according to Western diplomats. However, many issues remain unresolved and the chances of reaching an agreement on Iran’s nuclear program by March 30 are low, they add.

With Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu scheduled to leave on Sunday morning for Washington, ahead of his controversial speech to Congress on Tuesday, senior Israeli officials appraised of developments in the talks expressed concerns to representatives of the world powers.

The two previous rounds of talks between Iran and the six powers (the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany), in Munich and Geneva, focused on finding a formula that would keep Iran a year from obtaining enough high-level enriched uranium to manufacture one bomb

The two major components of the formula are the number of centrifuges Iran will be allowed to keep and the size of the stockpile of low-enriched uranium that it could retain.

The Western diplomats said that in the Munich talks early last month, the powers made a new offer to the Iranians, in which for the first six years of the agreement Iran could keep operating some 5,000 out of 9,400 old-model centrifuges, while 4,400 would go off-line in such a way that it would take a long time to reconnect them.

In the four following years, according to the Munich proposal, Iran would be able to increase its centrifuges to 7,800, and over the five ensuing years to 9,400, the number it currently operates. The proposal also called for most of the low-enriched uranium Iran currently has (about 6 tons) to be sent to Russia, where it would be converted into nuclear fuel for the reactor at Bushehr, Iran, leaving a symbolic 300-350 kilograms in Iran.

The diplomats said that, according to the proposal, the centrifuges Iran would keep would be reconfigured so they could only enrich a smaller amount of uranium. The deal also included an extensive reconfiguration plan of the enrichment facility at Natanz, proposed by the United States.

At the end of the Munich talks, the Iranians said they would give their answer at the following round of talks, which took place in Geneva last week. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif came to those talks, together with the head of Iran’s atomic energy agency, Ali Akbar Salehi, a close associate of Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The Western diplomats noted Salehi had said Iranian nuclear scientists had examined the proposal and decided it was too complex to implement, especially because of the reconfiguring plan for Natanz.

The Iranians surprised the representatives of the six powers when they presented their own alternative proposal, the diplomats said.

That proposal included, for the first time, concessions regarding their stockpile of enriched uranium, as well as a bid to cut the number of old-generation centrifuges by one third.

The Iranians proposed they keep 6,000 centrifuges out of the 9,400 for the first 10 years of the agreement, and keep 500 kilograms of their low-enriched uranium, or, alternatively, to operate 6,500 centrifuges and only retain 300 kilograms of their low-enriched uranium, the diplomats said. After 10 years, with only five years left on the agreement, the Iranian proposal would gradually increase the number of centrifuges to the number they have today, the diplomats added.

However, among the unresolved issues is the Iranian demand that all sanctions be lifted immediately upon signing the agreement, whereas the United States and the other powers want the sanctions lifted gradually if Iran is seen to be meeting its obligations.

Another stumbling block is Iran’s continuing refusal of the world powers’ demand to fully open all aspects of its military nuclear program to inspection by the International Atomic Energy Commission.

The diplomats say that, considering the issues still in dispute, it is difficult to imagine the parties coming to an agreement by March 30. If such an agreement does emerge, because of an Iranian and American need to show progress, it will be a general document of principles only and will not include details on the outstanding bones of contention.

Another round of talks is scheduled for this Thursday in Switzerland. These meetings are to be preceded tomorrow by a meeting in Switzerland between U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and his counterpart, Zarif. Salehi will also be present at that meeting.

At a press conference over the weekend, senior U.S. officials said “significant progress” had been made in the talks, but there were still many obstacles and they did not expect an agreement to emerge from this week’s talks.

Israel has been updated on the Iranian proposal in Geneva, which has given rise to greater concern in Jerusalem. Since the first round of talks in Geneva, National Security Adviser Yossi Cohen and Strategic and Intelligence Affairs Minister Yuval Steinitz have expressed their concerns to representatives of the powers.

A senior Israeli official said the two Israelis warned that the proposal leaves too many centrifuges in Iranian hands, does not include total dismantling of the off-line centrifuges, and does not address issues such as Iranian research and development of advanced centrifuges during the period of the agreement. Steinitz and Cohen also said they did not believe Iran would send its low-enriched uranium abroad.

Netanyahu will address Congress on Tuesday evening (Israel time). He is also due to speak to the pro-Israel lobby, AIPAC, tomorrow. In both speeches, Netanyahu will argue that the agreement with Tehran is “bad and dangerous,” and call for additional sanctions on Iran.

“I respect President Barack Obama and believe in the power of the ties between Israel and the United States, and their power to overcome differences,” Netanyahu said on Saturday, during a visit to the Western Wall. “As prime minister, it is my duty to ensure the security of Israel, and therefore we strongly oppose the agreement developing with Iran. We must explain the dangers stemming from this agreement to Israel, the region and the whole world,” Netanyahu added.

The White House plans to deal with Netanyahu’s speech by presenting counterarguments in a series of public appearances with Israeli officials. White House National Security Adviser Susan Rice is expected to address the AIPAC conference, to try and persuade the audience that the emerging agreement is the best option. “The challenge is for those who oppose the agreement like Netanyahu. They must present an alternative that will produce better results,” a senior U.S. official said over the weekend.