Iran threatens to axe cooperation with UN nuclear watchdog if sanctions are reimposed

Iran’s Supreme National Security Council on Saturday warned that the return of UN sanctions will halt Tehran’s cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog. In a meeting chaired by President Pezeshkian, Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, concluded that the Europeans’ push to reinstate UN sanctions on Iran “will in practice lead to a suspension of cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog,” the state TV said. Iran’s top security body said that the action by Britain, France, and Germany to reimpose UN sanctions will ‘effectively suspend’ its cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog.

The move has reignited fears that the Middle Eastern nation could begin enriching Uranium again. Iranian hardliners are pushing for Tehran’s withdrawal from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and even development of a nuclear bomb in response to the snapback of sanctions.

“Despite the foreign ministry’s cooperation with the (International Atomic Energy) Agency and the presentation of plans to resolve the issue, the actions of European countries will effectively suspend the path of cooperation with the agency,” the Supreme National Security Council said in a televised statement.

The UN Security Council failed to pass a resolution which would have stopped the sanctions coming back into force on Friday. The sanctions will return unless the nine members of the security council agree to prolong the sanctions relief.

The resolution was supported by China, Russia, Pakistan and Algeria.

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International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Grossi said US air strikes on three Iranian nuclear facilities had caused severe but ‘not total’ damage, casting doubt on Donald Trump’s claim that the sites were totally obliterated by the bunker-busting bomb and missile strikes.

Asked if Iran could still make a bomb if it wanted to, Grossi said, “Iran had a very vast ambitious programme, and part of it may still be there, and if not, there is also the self-evident truth that the knowledge is there. The industrial capacity is there. Iran is a very sophisticated country in terms of nuclear technology.”

US envoy to the United Nations Dorothea Shea said, in the absence of any further UN Security Council action, the vote means international sanctions will be re-imposed on Iran next month.