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The Guardian
29-06-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Iran's nuclear enrichment ‘will never stop', nation's UN ambassador says
Amir-Saeid Iravani, Iran's ambassador to the United Nations, said on Sunday that the Islamic republic's nuclear enrichment 'will never stop' because it is permitted for 'peaceful energy' purposes under the treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. 'The enrichment is our right, an inalienable right, and we want to implement this right,' Iravani told CBS News, adding that Iran was ready for negotiations but 'unconditional surrender is not negotiation. It is dictating the policy toward us.' But Iravani said Tehran is 'ready for the negotiation, but after this aggression, it is not proper condition for a new round of the negotiation, and there is no request for negotiation and meeting with the president'. The Iranian UN envoy also denied that there are any threats from his government to the safety of Raphael Grossi, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, or against the agency's inspectors, who are accused by some Iranian officials of helping Israel justify its attacks. IAEA inspectors are currently in Iran but do not have access to Iran's nuclear facilities. Pressed by the CBS News anchor Margaret Brennan on whether he would condemn calls for the arrest and execution of the IAEA head, which Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state said a newspaper close to Iran's leader had made, Iravani said that he would. 'There is no any threat,' Irvani said, but acknowledged that Iran's parliament had suspended cooperation with IAEA. The inspectors, he said, 'are in Iran, they are in safe conditions, but the activity has been suspended. They cannot have access to our site … our assessment is that they have not done their jobs.' Iravani also responded to questions on why Tehran has not accepted proposals for a diplomatic solution. Referring to Trump's 'unconditional surrender' demand, Irvani said that the US 'is dictating the policy towards us. If they are ready for negotiation, they will find us ready for that. But if they want to dictate us, it is impossible for any negotiation with them.' Iravani said on Saturday that Iran could transfer its stocks of enriched uranium to another country in the event of an agreement with the United States on Tehran's nuclear program, according to news site Al-Monitor. The transfer of 20% and 60% enriched uranium would not be a red line for Tehran, Iravani said, adding that the material could alternatively remain in Iran under IAEA supervision. But as he said again on Sunday, Iravani stressed that Iran would not renounce its right to domestic uranium production, a condition the US rejects. Irvani's comments comes as western nations, including the US, are pushing for Iran to resume negotiations over its nuclear program a week after the US launched strikes on three facilities, setting off days of heated dispute over whether the facilities has been 'totally obliterated', as Donald Trump initially claimed, or if they had delayed but not destroyed the program. Grossi told CBS that there is 'agreement in describing this as a very serious level of damage' but went on to say that Iran will likely will be able to begin to produce enriched uranium within months. 'The capacities they have are there,' he said. 'They can have, you know, in a matter of months, I would say, a few cascades of centrifuges spinning and producing enriched uranium, or less than that. But as I said, frankly speaking, one cannot claim that everything has disappeared and there is nothing there.' On Sunday, President Trump again dismissed reports that Iran had moved 400kg (880lb) on 60% enriched uranium ahead of the strikes on Fordow, regarded as the center of Iran's enrichment program. 'It's very hard to do, dangerous to do, it's very heavy, plus we didn't give them much notice because they didn't know they we were coming,' Trump told the Fox News host Maria Bartiromo. Trump speculated that vehicles seen near the entrances to Fordow before the strikes were likely masons brought in to seal up the facility. 'There are thousands of tons of rock in that room right now,' Trump said. 'They whole place was just destroyed.' However, the Washington Post reported on Sunday that the US obtained intercepted Iranian communications in which senior Iran officials remarked that damage from the attack was not as destructive and extensive as they anticipated. The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, scoffed at the Iranian claims in a comment to the Post in which she did not dispute that such communications had been intercepted. 'The notion that unnamed Iranian officials know what happened under hundreds of feet of rubble is nonsense,' Leavitt said. Separately on Sunday, Abdolrahim Mousavi, Iran's armed forces chief of staff, reportedly told the Saudi defense minister during a call that Tehran is not convinced Israel will honour the ceasefire that ended their 12-day war announced by Trump. 'Since we are completely doubtful about the enemy honoring its commitments, including the ceasefire, we are prepared to give it a tough response in case of recurrence of an act of aggression', Mousavi said, according to Turkey's state-run news agency Anadolu. Israel and the US, 'have shown that they do not adhere to any international rules and norms' the Iranian general added. 'We did not initiate war, but we responded with all our power to the aggressor.'
Miami Herald
17-06-2025
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Israel Plans to Contain Nuclear Fallout From Any Strike on Iran's Fordow
An Israeli official has said that the country was actively planning to mitigate the potential contamination emanating from strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities, including the massive underground complex at Fordow. Speaking on background during a virtual briefing Tuesday, the official confirmed that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had not yet targeted the Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant, believed to be a sprawling facility located up to 300 feet underground around 20 miles from the city of Qom, amid ongoing Israeli operations that began late Thursday across the Islamic Republic. At the same time, the Israeli official stated that further raids were planned against nuclear sites, and the IDF had drawn up calculations as to how to minimize the risk of fallout. "We haven't operated to Fordow to this moment, but that doesn't mean we won't," the official said. "We have not finished and achieved all the goals of this operation. I won't go into more specifics to that, but I will tell you that going into this operation, there was a lot of planning, a lot of thought of how to minimize the risk and damage for civilians." "And there's also a process to understand what are the possible effects of these kind of strikes on nuclear sites," they continued, adding that "the way we planned our operations is in a way that that there's never a 100 percent guarantee, but in a way that makes it very clear that that is not something that should happen, a nuclear disaster." The comments came after International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Raphael Grossi reported Friday on "radioactive and chemical contamination" at the Natanz Nuclear Facility, following an earlier IDF strike there. The IAEA said radiation levels outside the facility "remain unchanged." Grossi said that, while the Israeli strike appeared to have destroyed the above-ground facility at Natanz, the subterranean section showed "no indications of damage." The Israeli official on Tuesday questioned the sourcing of the IAEA findings, saying the initial assessment of the IDF operation was that the strike "was a success," though the results were still being studied. Asked by Newsweek if the IDF had the capability to effectively destroy the underground complexes of nuclear sites in Fordow, Natanz or elsewhere without the support of the United States, the Israeli official touted the military's capabilities, without getting into specifics. "We have prepared for this operation on different levels for years," they said. "This is a well-planned operation, and we have a lot of different capabilities, and we have a few surprises up our sleeve, and we leave it at that. "We have had a lot of success already," the official added. "There is more to come, and we are prepared to operate against the Iranian nuclear plants on ourselves and have the right achievements and be smarter once all this is said and done, but we've had a lot of success so far." The Israeli official also referred to "a lot of innovation" among the IDF's capabilities, pointing specifically to prior operations conducted "in different places throughout the Middle East," as well as "our capabilities operating against different targets underground, including targeted elimination of arch terrorists underground in real time." In September, nearly a year into the ongoing war in Gaza that sparked soaring regional tensions, the IDF killed longtime Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah in a raid against his underground bunker in the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, Beirut. A number of current and former Israeli officials have doubted the IDF's capability to take out Iran's heavily fortified underground nuclear facilities, given that the Israeli military was not known to possess the kind of 15-ton "bunker buster" bombs produced by the U.S., nor the aircraft necessary to deliver them. Questions over the IDF's capabilities have raised speculation that the U.S. may become directly involved in the conflict, a notion further fueled by the movement of U.S. military aircraft and ships to the Middle East in recent days, as well as President Donald Trump's ominous warnings to Iran as he left a G7 meeting early in Canada late Monday. Trump called for the immediate evacuation of Tehran, home to around 10 million residents. The Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant is located roughly 125 miles south of the Iranian capital. Responding to French President Emmanuel Macron's claim that the U.S. leader had left to work toward a ceasefire as Israel and Iran continue to trade strikes, Trump said early Tuesday that he was working on something "much bigger than that." Trump has consistently warned that Iran could not be allowed to possess a nuclear weapon, something the Islamic Republic has always denied seeking to build. Related Articles Nuclear Bomb Map Shows Impact of US Weapons on IranChina Touts Weapons Capabilities As Iran's Defenses CollapseDavid Hogg Says Dems Backing Iran War Should Be PrimariedSatellite Images Show Israeli Damage at Key Iran Missile Base 2025 NEWSWEEK DIGITAL LLC.
Newsweek
17-06-2025
- Politics
- Newsweek
Israel Plans to Contain Nuclear Fallout From Any Strike on Iran's Fordow
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. An Israeli official has said that the country was actively planning to mitigate the potential contamination emanating from strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities, including the massive underground complex at Fordow. Speaking on background during a virtual briefing Tuesday, the official confirmed that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had not yet targeted the Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant, believed to be a sprawling facility located up to 300 feet underground around 20 miles from the city of Qom, amid ongoing Israeli operations that began late Thursday across the Islamic Republic. At the same time, the Israeli official stated that further raids were planned against nuclear sites, and the IDF had drawn up calculations as to how to minimize the risk of fallout. "We haven't operated to Fordow to this moment, but that doesn't mean we won't," the official said. "We have not finished and achieved all the goals of this operation. I won't go into more specifics to that, but I will tell you that going into this operation, there was a lot of planning, a lot of thought of how to minimize the risk and damage for civilians." "And there's also a process to understand what are the possible effects of these kind of strikes on nuclear sites," they continued, adding that "the way we planned our operations is in a way that that there's never a 100 percent guarantee, but in a way that makes it very clear that that is not something that should happen, a nuclear disaster." The comments came after International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Raphael Grossi reported Friday on "radioactive and chemical contamination" at the Natanz Nuclear Facility, following an earlier IDF strike there. The IAEA said radiation levels outside the facility "remain unchanged." Grossi said that, while the Israeli strike appeared to have destroyed the above-ground facility at Natanz, the subterranean section showed "no indications of damage." A radiation warning sign is placed on the road as part of a contamination perimeter during a training simulation in Tehran, Iran, on November 5, 2015. A radiation warning sign is placed on the road as part of a contamination perimeter during a training simulation in Tehran, Iran, on November 5, 2015. MOHAMAD ALI NAJIB/Middle East Images/AFP/Getty Images The Israeli official on Tuesday questioned the sourcing of the IAEA findings, saying the initial assessment of the IDF operation was that the strike "was a success," though the results were still being studied. Asked by Newsweek if the IDF had the capability to effectively destroy the underground complexes of nuclear sites in Fordow, Natanz or elsewhere without the support of the United States, the Israeli official touted the military's capabilities, without getting into specifics. "We have prepared for this operation on different levels for years," they said. "This is a well-planned operation, and we have a lot of different capabilities, and we have a few surprises up our sleeve, and we leave it at that. "We have had a lot of success already," the official added. "There is more to come, and we are prepared to operate against the Iranian nuclear plants on ourselves and have the right achievements and be smarter once all this is said and done, but we've had a lot of success so far." The Israeli official also referred to "a lot of innovation" among the IDF's capabilities, pointing specifically to prior operations conducted "in different places throughout the Middle East," as well as "our capabilities operating against different targets underground, including targeted elimination of arch terrorists underground in real time." In September, nearly a year into the ongoing war in Gaza that sparked soaring regional tensions, the IDF killed longtime Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah in a raid against his underground bunker in the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, Beirut. A number of current and former Israeli officials have doubted the IDF's capability to take out Iran's heavily fortified underground nuclear facilities, given that the Israeli military was not known to possess the kind of 15-ton "bunker buster" bombs produced by the U.S., nor the aircraft necessary to deliver them. Questions over the IDF's capabilities have raised speculation that the U.S. may become directly involved in the conflict, a notion further fueled by the movement of U.S. military aircraft and ships to the Middle East in recent days, as well as President Donald Trump's ominous warnings to Iran as he left a G7 meeting early in Canada late Monday. Trump called for the immediate evacuation of Tehran, home to around 10 million residents. The Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant is located roughly 125 miles south of the Iranian capital. Responding to French President Emmanuel Macron's claim that the U.S. leader had left to work toward a ceasefire as Israel and Iran continue to trade strikes, Trump said early Tuesday that he was working on something "much bigger than that." Trump has consistently warned that Iran could not be allowed to possess a nuclear weapon, something the Islamic Republic has always denied seeking to build.
