Iran has reached a historic deal regarding its nuclear program after talks with a group of six nations led by United States. The talks were held in Vienna on Tuesday July 14, 2015 and were in continuation of almost 20 months talks. Though the agreement would require further assurance from the US Congress and the Iranian supreme leader Ayatullah Khamenai, and it would face severe criticism from Israel, it is considered to be a great achievement as it was once difficult to believe that Iran’s nuclear issue would be solved through negotiations.
Commenting on the success of the negotiations, the US president Barack Obama, said in a conference, “Today after two years of negotiation the United States together with the international community has achieved something that decades of animosity has not: a comprehensive long-term deal with Iran that will prevent it from obtaining a nuclear weapon.”
The deal is a great achievement for Obama government as it had been seeking a negotiated solution to the issue; however, it will face some harsh criticism from the Republicans.
Same is the case with Iranian president Hassan Rouhani – he has shown very liberal approach towards the West and has strived for negotiated solution. Describing the deal a success, he said, “Negotiators have reached a good agreement and I announce to our people that our prayers have come true.”
The deal suggests reducing Iranian centrifuges by two-thirds. It places bans on enrichment at key facilities, and limits uranium research and development to the Natanz facility. The deal caps uranium enrichment at 3.67 percent and limits the stockpile to 300 kg, all for 15 years. Moreover, Iran will be required to ship spent fuel out of the country forever, as well as allow inspectors from the IAEA inspectors certain access in perpetuity. Heightened inspections, including tracking uranium mining and monitoring the production and storage of centrifuges, will last for up to 20 years.
According to the estimates by US, the new measures take Iran from being able to assemble its first bomb within 2-3 months, to at least one year from now.
The main controversy regarding Iran’s nuclear program started when in 2009, IAEA, through a secret document reported that Iran possesses “sufficient information” to construct a nuclear device and had even worked on developing a warhead with the capacity of being carried on a missile.
However, the agency accepted that their information was not based on concrete proof. Later on, the IAEA chief ElBaradei in September 2009 commented in an interview, “I do not think based on what we see that Iran has an ongoing nuclear weapons program,” and accepted that Iran’s nuclear weapons development has been “hyped”.
Since then, the controversies about Iran’s nuclear program kept on rising and they became very serious. On the other hand, there were controversies about the raw material provided for these plants. There was ban on providing Iran nuclear fuel rods; however Iran claimed that it had the capacity to build its own rods. Iran continued to pursue its nuclear program even after many controversies and opposition. The ban on Iran reached to the extent of banning oil business with the country. The European countries that used to purchase a considerable portion of Iran’s oil banned to import oil from Iran, which was Iran’s main export.
Iran had depended on Russia and China for some sort of favor regarding its stand about its program and these two countries backed Iran to a certain extent. Showing their dominant role in the region and avoid any sort of tension in Iran that may influence the region these two countries have been taking cautious steps.
United Nations Organization in this regard has been urging Iran for transparent nuclear program. Keeping in view the mounting pressure from international community, UN Security Council imposed sanctions on Iran under resolutions 1737, 1747, 1803 and 1929. Under these sanctions, there was ban on the sale of material and technology related to nuclear enrichment and ballistic missile development to Iran; restriction on dealing with Iranian banks and individuals and restriction on major arms systems to Iran and strict inspections of air and sea cargoes.
Apart from these sanctions there were certain other sanctions imposed by the US and EU including the recent oil embargo. All these sanctions were imposed because US and other major countries in the world doubted Iran’s nuclear program and feared any sort of development of nuclear weapons in Iran.
Definitely all the capable countries of the world have the right to follow friendly and secure nuclear programs but it should also be kept in mind that there are many secret stories regarding the different nuclear plants in the world and they really pose a threat to humanity.
All the nuclear plants in the world must be made transparent and secret stories should be disclosed along with all the ill intentions and ambiguities. Strict check on all the nuclear plants in the world is necessary. That is only possible through IAEA but it should be given more strength and authority.
Further, it should not be biased and must not be politically inclined and above all must treat all the countries of the world alike as far as nuclear threats are concerned. Otherwise, stopping different countries from developing nuclear weapons would be really very difficult and the race of nuclear weapons may continue until the human extinction.