Iran denies IAEA access to nuclear site it says was sabotaged by Israel – report

Iran reportedly denied access to UN inspectors who were seeking to visit the Karaj centrifuge assembly site on Sunday, several months after a sabotage incident at the facility, which Tehran blamed on Israel.

Citing several unnamed sources, the the Wall Street Journal reported that International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors were seeking to replace and fix up cameras at the site as part of a deal struck earlier this month.

Iran is preparing to send a note to the IAEA explaining that the denial of access was due to safety issues at the site and the ongoing collection of forensic evidence there, the report said.

However, the report cast doubt on the response, citing sources as saying that Iran has continued some activities at Karaj, a city about 40 kilometers (25 miles) northwest of Tehran.

The sources predicted that the incident would not lead to a new push for an IAEA resolution against Iran. By agreeing earlier this month to allow inspectors to replace memory cards in surveillance cameras, Iran averted IAEA censure over its refusal to grant inspectors access to sites.

The IAEA board is set to convene Monday for a previously scheduled meeting.

In June, Iran accused Israel of mounting a sabotage attack on the Karaj site, which makes components for machines used to enrich uranium. Without disclosing details, Iranian authorities acknowledged that the alleged strike had damaged the building.

Earlier this month, a confidential IAEA report revealed that the nuclear watchdog found that one surveillance camera was destroyed and a second was severely damaged, after their removal from the centrifuge manufacturing site in Karaj.

Days later, Iran admitted that it had removed several IAEA cameras from the site.

IAEA inspections are a key part of the 2015 nuclear deal struck between Iran and world powers.

The pact, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), granted Iran relief from sanctions in return for dismantling parts of its nuclear program to prevent it from obtaining nuclear weapons.

After former United States president Donald Trump pulled out of the deal in 2018 and reapplied crippling sanctions, Iran also dropped some of its own commitments, notably upping its uranium enrichment to levels said to put it within a few months’ grasp of enough material for a weapon.

Iran’s hardline parliament in December approved a bill that would suspend part of UN inspections of its nuclear facilities if European signatories did not provide relief from oil and banking sanctions by February.

The Biden administration has said that it is willing to return to the JCPOA, if Iran first rolls back its recent moves and recommits. But the Vienna talks have been on hold since June, when ultraconservative Ebrahim Raisi was elected as Iran’s president.