Gharibabadi questions IAEA impartiality

In an address to a Thursday meeting of the IAEA Board of Governors in Vienna, he urged the international body to refrain from pursuing any political agenda and stop biased treatment of member states.

“The Agency should not act in a way that it would be directly or indirectly supporting the political agenda of certain parties against others. Undoubtedly, this method of biased treatment of member states not only harms the nonproliferation regime but also reduces trust in the Agency’s professional activities and lowers cooperation between the Agency and its member states,” he said in his remarks.

He also advised the UN nuclear agency to refrain from pursuing any political agenda, and instead take a transparent stance on the Israeli regime’s "unacceptable" failure to join the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and its continued refusal to place all of its nuclear activities and facilities under the IAEA comprehensive safeguards agreements.

This is a “bitter historical joke,” Iran's ambassador said while pointing to negligence on the part of the IAEA toward the Israeli regime’s nuclear weapons program in the volatile Middle East region, Press TV reported.

“Regrettably, this regime (Israel) ignores the international community by downplaying the importance of the (NPT), refusing to accept it, and... placing all of its nuclear facilities and activities under the Agency’s comprehensive safeguards regime,” Gharibabadi stated.

According to the Iranian ambassador, such circumstances have emboldened Israel to deride the IAEA’s mandate and mission to prevent the diversion of the regime’s nuclear materials and activities.

Most importantly, the Israeli regime has been so brazen that it distorts the facts and criticizes some members of the NPT, he said, adding that this is a very serious failure on the part of the Agency, which needs to be properly addressed.

“The Agency’s silence in this regard, along with its deafening silence over the assassination of (Iran’s) nuclear scientists and the acts of terror and sabotage at Iran’s nuclear facilities, calls into question the Agency’s credibility and impartiality and arouses suspicion that it is a political organization rather than a professional one,” the Iranian envoy remarked.

Gharibabadi then called on the IAEA to immediately address the concerns he raised, saying the Islamic Republic strongly warns against any adventurism by the Israeli regime.

He said Iran will not only give a decisive response should such criminal actions, including the assassination of Iran’s nuclear scientist, reoccur, but also there will be no other way for Tehran but to reconsider its transparency-building measures and its cooperation with the IAEA.

Iran has continued to fulfill its commitments under the Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement, the ambassador said, adding that the country will continue to take any necessary transparency-building measure and grant any necessary access to its nuclear activities as per the Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement.

Gharibabadi noted that all nuclear materials in Iran are under the Agency’s safeguards as per the Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement and there has never been seen any sign of diversion in Iran’s nuclear materials or declared activities.

Iran’s ambassador also sharply criticized the latest report on Iran’s nuclear program by IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi, saying that while Iran has been engaged in practical and constructive interactions with the Agency, it is regrettable that the Agency’s secretariat has taken an unconstructive approach to Iran at the cost of harming its own credibility.

The Agency’s latest report, he said, is a repetition of its previous one without any mention of the latest progress made by the two sides.

This report, Gharibabadi noted, proves the IAEA secretariat’s one-sided approach to Iran, which ignores the level of cooperation and interaction between the two sides.

Iran’s ambassador finally noted that the continuation of such an approach to Iran’s nuclear activities by the Agency can turn into an obstacle to future goodwill interactions between the two sides.

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