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A Nuclear Proposal for Iran| by Kaveh Afrasiabi | Released: 6 Oct 2006 |
This week the United States has warned that the current Iran-European negotiations are the last chance for Iran to accept a compromise before sanctions are initiated at the UN Security Council. But unless the UN is prepared and capable of imposing severe sanctions that translate into more than wrist slaps, Iran is highly to respond to punitive measures, and this raises the specter of some kind of military confrontation.
There may be an opportunity to solve the Iran nuclear crisis in light of Iran's suggestion of a French-led enrichment program announced recently by Mohammad Saidi, the Deputy Director of Iran's atomic agency. The development could take two different forms: either a brand new enrichment facility by an international holding company, or the conversion of the present Iranian enrichment program into one jointly owned and operated by Iran and outside governments. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has already envisioned the possibility of multi-lateral operation of existing facilities.
Under this scenario, Iran would pledge not to engage in any other enrichment activities. This is a pledge that has been made by several countries joining Urenco, the Dutch-led uranium enrichment consortium, which keeps sensitive parts of its operations in a "black box," that is, outside the purview of local scientists and technicians.
A recent example of such an operation is the Urenco/Louisiana Energy Services (LES) corporation for a joint enrichment facility in New Mexico. Per that agreement, sensitive Urenco centrifuge technology is totally enclosed within an outer vacuum casing. This prevents the local employees from seeing sensitive components, nor will they get information on how to repair the centrifuges.
In the Iranian scenerio, centrifuges would be imported into Iran as complete units and removed from the country as complete units if in need of repair. While the Iranian personnel working at the joint facility would operate them, the centrifuge units would be installed and removed solely by outside employees.
The joint venture could essentially guarantee that Iran would not divert any of the low enriched uranium for military purposes. Western technicians would be permanently present at the facility, which would be jointly operated with respect to business activities, and other operational decisions. This would be coupled with constant IAEA inspections and remote monitoring to verify Iran's compliance with the safeguard standards.
Following a recent proposal by two MIT scientists, the joint venture could be created as a holding company that would lease centrifuges from an outside source such as Urenco. A typical Urenco facility, equipped with 50,000 advanced T-21 centrifuges, is capable of producing fuels for 42 1,000 megawatt nuclear power plants, like the one under construction in Bushehr.
The partners in the holding company could include the Iranian government and two or more European countries that have been at the forefront of negotiating with Iran. Russia might join as well, in light of Moscow's current role as Tehran's sole nuclear partner. Russia has just announced the completion date for the Bushehr power plant -- November 2007, and has recently signed an agreement with Iran on the return of spent fuel.
As for the capital needed for the multilateral holding company, the participants would provide the capital for the equipment and land lease in proportion to their equity in the company. This plan would not only secure Iran's need for nuclear fuel for its reactors -- and Iran has plans to purchase more reactors from Russia in the near future -- but it would also produce enough low enriched uranium for export to the growing global market for enriched uranium. Most importantly, the plan provides a firm guarantee that Iran would not be developing nuclear weapons by exercising its NPT rights.
Kevah Afrasiabi is a political scientist and author of Iran's Nuclear Program: Debating Facts vs. Fiction.
Copyright ©2006 Kaveh Afrasiabi / Agence Global
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Released: 05 October 2006
Word Count: 606
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