Araqchi said that there were issues between Iran and the IAEA whose evaluation is both beyond the agency’s duties and outside Iran’s commitments in accordance with the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), but in order to eliminate them there was a need for a framework for cooperation between Iran and the agency.
The deputy foreign minister told the Iranian state-run TV on Sunday night that the agreement was signed following a few rounds of talks between Amano and the head of the Head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Ali Akbar Salehi, which in turn has a number of phases, including the moves that need to be made in the first step.
He said that the agency’s inspectors’ visit and inspection of the Arak heavy water reactor was in that framework, which is a separate path from the Iran-Sextet talks.
Araqchi also expressed the hope that the remaining issues between Iran and the agency, too, would be resolved in the course of this new move based on good will and the political interactions between Iran and the Group 5+1 (the five permanent UN Security Council members plus Germany), contributing to proper progress towards final settlement of Iran’s nuclear issue.
The IAEA inspectors arrived in Tehran earlier this month to visit Arak heavy water reactor for a third time.
During their visit to Iran, the IAEA inspectors held a meeting with the officials of the AEOI and then visited Arak heavy water installations.
The Islamic Republic of Iran, as a sign of goodwill to remove any possible ambiguity about the peaceful nature of its nuclear program, has given a positive response to the request made by the IAEA to visit the plant, the AEOI said in a statement earlier this month.
