{"id":252344,"date":"2021-11-30T12:17:21","date_gmt":"2021-11-30T17:17:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ncr-iran.org\/en\/?p=252344"},"modified":"2023-02-02T21:40:36","modified_gmt":"2023-02-02T20:40:36","slug":"irans-former-nuclear-head-references-weapons-while-tehran-digs-in-for-vienna-talks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ncr-iran.org\/en\/news\/nuclear\/irans-former-nuclear-head-references-weapons-while-tehran-digs-in-for-vienna-talks\/","title":{"rendered":"Iran\u2019s Former Nuclear Head References Weapons While Tehran Digs in for Vienna Talks"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"iran-irgc-missile\"<\/p>\n

Two days before nuclear talks resumed in Vienna, a former head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) spoke to Iranian state media about recent years\u2019 advances to the nuclear program. He credited Mohsen Fakhrizadeh<\/a>, the nuclear scientist assassinated last year, with creating the system that is currently regarded as such a serious threat by Tehran\u2019s adversaries.<\/p>\n

Fereydoun Abbasi-Davani\u2019s reference<\/a> to \u201cnuclear weapons\u201d is the latest piece of evidence supporting that the Iranian regime has never given up its goal of acquiring an atomic bomb. The International Atomic Energy Agency has reported in no uncertain terms that the Iranian regime had a nuclear weapons program at one point, but appeared to dismantle it following early revelations about the country\u2019s clandestine activities. Officially, Tehran denies having ever worked toward the acquisition of nuclear weapons, but Abbasi-Davani is not the first Iranian official to tacitly acknowledge that this talking point is false.<\/p>\n

Last February, then-Intelligence Minister Mahmoud Alavi stated plainly<\/a> that Iran might acquire a nuclear weapon, but declared that \u201cthose who pushed Iran in that direction\u201d would be to blame in that case. His remarks explicitly referenced a fatwa issued by the regime\u2019s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei which supposedly declared nuclear weapons to be contrary to Islam and thus off-limits to the Iranian regime. But by intimating that this restriction could be openly violated, Alavi gave fuel to critics\u2019 arguments that the fatwa was never binding and was primarily intended to deflect international concern over dual-purpose activities that could shorten Iran\u2019s \u201cbreakout\u201d window for developing a nuclear warhead.<\/p>\n

If that is the case, the supreme leader\u2019s strategy has arguably been quite successful. In the run-up to the signing of the seven-party nuclear agreement in 2015, and in the time during which the signatories have been working to restore that agreement following the US withdrawal in 2018, some policymakers have shown themselves willing to proceed based on the assumption that Iran primarily wants to advance its nuclear program for civilian purposes. This remains as the regime\u2019s public claim, although its activities over the past two years have raised more and more doubt.<\/p>\n

In early 2020, the regime announced that it would no longer comply with any terms whatsoever, and this set the stage for public disclosure that some Iranian facilities had resumed enrichment of uranium to 20 percent fissile purity. Prior to the signing of the JCPOA, this was the highest known enrichment level Iran had achieved, and it is considered to be a relatively short technical step away from 90 percent<\/a> enrichment, which constitutes weapons-grade.<\/p>\n

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The intelligence minister Mahmoud Alavi talks about Iran nuclear deal & MOIS measures against MEK<\/div><\/div>
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