Iran nuclear programme ‘more advanced than was thought’
► IRAN IS ABLE to make enough highly enriched uranium for two nuclear bombs in just four weeks, officials from the atomic watchdog fear.
While experts say it would take a further few months to overcome the remaining technological hurdles to a usable weapon, it means that Tehran’s programme is more advanced than previously thought.
The chilling new evidence comes as a deal with Iran freeing it from sanctions is thought to be imminent — unfreezing an estimated $100bn in assets for the regime.
Observers fear the huge cash influx will fuel a new reign of terror by Iran and its proxies against Israel and across the Gulf region.
The revelation that Iran is so close to a nuclear bomb comes from the International Atomic Energy Authority (IAEA). Asked by the JC about the disturbing new findings, a senior Israeli official said: “We have a huge problem.”
It had been thought that the regime was at least six months from amassing enough fissile material to build a bomb.
But the disclosures from the IAEA have cut this period dramatically.
An analysis of the IAEA data, led by renowned expert David Albright at the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) in Washington, states: “Due to the growth of Iran’s 20 and 60 per cent enriched uranium stocks, breakout timelines have become dangerously short, far shorter than just a few months ago.”
If Iran walked away from the deal, the ISIS analysis says, it would have enough fissile material to build two bombs in four weeks, and enough for two more within four months.
Negotiations in Vienna to revive the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) agreed by President Obama in 2015 and later abandoned by President Trump are expected to arrive at a deal as soon as next week.
Under a renewed JCPOA, Iran would have to “downblend” its 60 per cent enriched uranium by diluting it. But it could keep its advanced centrifuges in storage, and under the deal’s “sunset clauses”, most nuclear restrictions would end between 2026 and 2031.
In return for submitting to inspections and agreeing to restrictions, Iran would see many sanctions lifted — giving it access not only to about
$100bn in frozen assets but also an income of $55bn a year from oil sales, a figure that seems certain to rise as the Ukraine war pushes up the oil price.
The senior Israeli official said: “This will push many billions of dollars into the Iranian economy, much of which will not benefit the Iranian people but Iran’s proxies for terror.
“The deal has a very short lifespan. By 2031, Iran will be able to make as much uranium as it wants, enriched to whatever level it wants — with the approval of the international community.”
The official added: “It’s really hard to detect weaponisation. It can be done in small facilities by very few people. They could be doing a test before we knew anything about what was going on.”
The IAEA has also discovered that Iran made far greater progress almost 20 years ago to making an atomic device than had previously been known.
The work had been carried out at a site near Tehran called Lavizan-Shian, the former national headquarters of the nuclear weapons programme that was closed in 2004.
Evidence shows that Iran had refined a crucial material used to build bombs, uranium metal. Scientists at the site were also working on a neutron-shower bomb trigger, a device that kick-starts a nuclear reaction and forms a crucial part of some atomic weapons.
The revelations raise fears that western intelligence agencies may be in the dark about the progress of parts of Iran’s weapons programme.
An ISIS spokesperson said: “If Iran continues its deception during the implementation period of a new nuclear deal, a practice it followed during the implementation period of the JCPOA, sanctions should not be reduced.”
The talks in Vienna have continued despite the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, which, along with Iran, Britain and the US, is at the negotiating table.
Vladimir Putin’s envoys are demanding that any sanctions imposed because of the Ukraine invasion must not affect its trade with Iran – which western experts say is likely to increase hugely.
Gabriel Noronha, a former senior US State Department official in charge of dealing with Iran in Trump’s administration, told the JC that Iran could do “whatever it likes” with the money acquired by the end of
sanctions.