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It’s been little remarked upon, but the United States appears to have a technical role, and not just a political one, in the agreement with Iran reached “in principle” in Geneva on October 1.

There’s no text in open circulation, and the U.S. government won’t say what’s in it. As a senior administration official told the New York Times after last week’s technical negotiations in Vienna, it’s the better part of valor to let Tehran spin the results.

But as it turns out, the Iranian government has already given us a general idea. After the Vienna talks concluded, the head of the Iranian delegation, Ambassador to the IAEA Ali Ashgar Soltanieh, told the press that the U.S. would provide the wherewithal for what sounds like a new IAEA Technical Cooperation effort connected to the Tehran Research Reactor.

Here’s the full quote, via Julian Borger:

We had a trilateral meeting in the office of the DG (director general) – Iran, US and the IAEA – on the issue of the Tehran research reactor and of course one of the aspects in addition to the fuel is the control instrumentation and safety equipment of the reactor — as we have been informed about the readiness of the United States in a technical project with the IAEA to cooperate in this respect – and this will be also further elaborated at a later stage.

In case you’re wondering, a broad humanitarian exemption in UNSC Res. 1737 permits the importation of nuclear-related equipment for medical or safety purposes, among other things. (On the medical role of the Tehran Research Reactor, see A Primer on Iran’s Medical Reactor Plans, October 4, 2009.) In fact, a variety of TC efforts related to medicine, safety, agriculture, or public health are already underway in Iran, as described in a special IAEA report from February 2007.

Where This Comes From

The odds are pretty good that this aspect of the deal was part of the original Geneva agreement, and did not simply arise in the course of the Vienna talks.

First, in the days after the Geneva meeting, a variety of senior Iranian officials suddenly began talking about the high importance of improving the safety of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure. Safety even started cropping up as an explanation for the delayed start of the Bushehr reactor and (yes, really) the construction of the Qom enrichment plant. In hindsight, this outbreak of safety-mindedness seems like a way of burnishing a yet-to-be-fully-disclosed achievement.

Second, a seat at the main table in technical talks implies a technical role. Of the six great powers represented at Geneva, only Russia, France, and America participated in the technical negotiations with Iran last week. Lacking a technical role, China, Germany, and Britain sat it out.

Why It Matters

This entire subject might seem like a triviality at first glance, but it actually provides an important signal that the U.S. is serious when it says that Iran has both rights and responsibilities in the nuclear field — a theme touched on by President Obama on September 25 and apparently raised by the U.S. side in Geneva. (The same idea also appeared a couple of times last week in Secretary of State Clinton’s NPT speech.)

Assisting in the refurbishment of an Iranian research reactor is a material assurance of American intentions, which should undercut talk that the U.S. simply wants to deny Iran the benefits of nuclear technology. That is presumably the significance of these remarks in an interview by Soltanieh shortly after the Vienna round of talks:

“The Vienna talks are a new chapter in cooperation between Iran and the other participating states… We will be waiting to see whether they will stay true to their words and promises,” Tehran’s envoy to the UN nuclear watchdog told Al-Alam news channel.

“The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will be a witness to the other states’ behaviors when it comes to technical cooperation on using nuclear energy for peaceful purposes,” said Ali Asqar Soltanieh.

The underlying logic of the agreement seems to be coming into focus: Iran demonstrates the peaceful purposes of its nuclear program by shipping its LEU out for conversion to fuel; America demonstrates its acceptance of peaceful Iranian nuclear technology by participating in its development. This symmetrical arrangement creates an intriguing precedent for future rounds.

Whether It Will Happen

Foot-dragging has now set in. According to the IAEA, Iran has disregarded Director-General ElBaradei’s Friday deadline, and now plans to respond by the middle of next week. Given a variety of anonymous statements in the Iranian press, as well as the frank opposition expressed by a parliamentarian allied with a rival to President Ahmadinejad, a cloud of doubt has settled in.

There’s been a great deal of doubt all along, and it’s not hard to see why. Iran’s approach to the TRR talks has been a ceaseless series of manuevers. One aspect brings to mind Schrödinger’s cat. (LEU exports for TRR refueling, or just TRR refueling? Half the statements in the Iranian press say one thing, half the other.) Another aspect brings to mind the car salesman who, pressed to agree to a lower price, has to walk back to check with his manager first.

My own view remains basically the same as it did after the second day of the Vienna talks, when negotiations were widely perceived as stalled (see: Iran: What Sort of a Deal?, October 20, 2009). The foot-dragging, in my judgment, is tactical, and we’re likely to see the Iranians agree at any time between the conclusion of the initial inspections at Qom and the opening of the next IAEA Board of Governors meeting, set for November 26-27. But I’ll keep a can of alphabet soup close at hand, just in case.

Update. I’d completely missed it, but Julian Borger — whose blog is quoted above — had this story in the Guardian all the way back on Wednesday:

The four signatories to the draft agreement are Iran, France, Russia and the IAEA. The US took part in the Vienna talks but is not a formal party to the deal. However, the US and Iran struck a provisional bilateral agreement, also brokered by the IAEA, in which Washington would supply safety equipment for the Tehran reactor.

That deal is contingent on agreement over the shipping of Iran’s uranium, but if signed, it would represent the most significant business transaction between the two countries since Iran’s Islamic revolution 30 years ago.

The sourcing is opaque, but it does sound as if he got confirmation, and wasn’t relying exclusively on Soltanieh’s remarks.

Barbara Slavin of the Washington Times had the story in Friday’s paper, and reports that she got it from an American, too:

To sweeten the deal for the uranium transfer, the Obama administration has offered to provide safety upgrades for the Tehran research reactor, which was sent to Iran in 1968 when Lyndon Johnson was president and the U.S.-backed Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was in power.

A U.S. official, who spoke on the condition that he not be named to avoid prejudicing Iran’s decisionmaking, said “the U.S. is willing to provide through the IAEA safety upgrades” for the Tehran reactor so that it will work properly with the new fuel.

Hats off to Borger and Slavin. If anyone else had it, I haven’t spotted it as of this moment.

Comment [13]

I do hope I won’t have to eat these words in a few hours, but here goes: Don’t be distracted by the Sturm und Drang from Vienna. Despite Tuesday’s events — which converted multilateral negotiations into some combination of bilaterals and proximity talks — the odds are quite good that the IAEA soon will be able to announce a deal between Iran and the American-Russian-French sides.

The noise around the role of France looks like Iran’s effort to see what it can gain by exploiting differences between Paris and Washington. (These were previewed in Sunday’s Post by Glenn Kessler.) Any wily negotiator might do the same.

But if the Foreign Ministry document discussed here earlier is accurate (see: France’s Role in the LEU-TRR Deal, October 9, 2009), it will be tough to exclude France from any refueling arrangements for the Tehran Research Reactor, since only French and Argentine industry make the type of fuel assemblies used there.

To save face, some sort of subcontracting arrangement might be ginned up. On the substance, though, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner is sticking to his guns:

Kouchner indicated that Paris was ready to bow out of formal participation in the deal but would not compromise on insisting that Tehran ship out most of its enriched material.

If Iran accepts, “it must be before the end of the year, there must be at least 1,200 kilograms — on that we won’t back down,” Kouchner told reporters in Paris.

And whatever Iran’s precise reasons for initiating these talks back in June — the same month as the Presidential elections — it is hard to see them walking away now. As Nima Gerami and James Acton remind us, an IAEA Board of Governors meeting is coming up in late November, with the Qom issue looming large. The dispute over the weaponization file hasn’t gone away, either. Now is the time for Tehran to strike a bargain.

Update. Right on schedule:

Caution: Do Not Oversell

It’s easy to get absorbed in the minutiae of site-specific safeguards and takeback arrangements, so let’s keep in mind what the parties really seem to be getting. Iran can duck the worst of the fallout from the Qom affair and gain implicit acceptance of its enrichment activities. (Emphasis on “implicit.”) The P5+1 can put time back on the clock by getting that 1,200 kg LEU out of the country. And in the implementation phase, the sides will be able to test each other’s intentions and create some trust at the working level, assuming there are no major hitches.

Here’s how a nameless insider put it to Howard LaFranchi of the Christian Science Monitor:

With this plan, “we are buying something like seven to 10 months,” says a senior European diplomat in Washington with close knowledge of the nuclear talks. “Perhaps step by step, we could build something out of this.”

IAEA DG Mohamed ElBaradei has gone even further, with heady talk about a grand bargain.

There are just a couple of problems here.

First, it’s not necessarily a matter of seven to ten months. There are at least 50 IR-1 cascades now installed at Natanz, although many were still under vacuum in August (see: Twenty-Two Cascades Under Vacuum, August 28, 2009). According to Alexander Glaser, a single cascade of 164 IR-1s could be expected to produce up to 113 kg of 3.5% enriched LEU per year. Discount the efficiency of operations somewhat (Geoff Forden suggests 85% based on past performance at Natanz), and Iran could recreate 1,200 kg of 3.5% enriched LEU in a shade over four months using 36 cascades. With 54 cascades going, it would take less than three months.

[Update | Dec. 6, 2009. This estimate depends on what is almost surely an overestimate of the separative power of the IR-1. Glaser cites Mark Hibbs’ Jan. 31, 2005 article in Nuclear Fuel, which describes the separative power of the URENCO equipment on which the IR-1 is based. For further explanation, see here.]

I’m not predicting that Iran will go flat-out to recreate its present LEU stockpile, but I would expect them to keep enriching at some rate. That rate may vary; having discovered what sort of safeguarded LEU stockpile the P5+1 are prepared to tolerate, the Iranian side might seek to influence the pace and urgency of future talks by the pace of operations at Natanz.

Second, we cannot really expect this narrow, technical transaction to bring about a sea change in relations. For a preview of how the Iranians are likely to sell it to their own public, consider this item from the IRIB news agency, which couches the EUP export as an Iranian demand:

The Islamic Republic of Iran demands that up to %5 of enrichment for Tehran’s research reactor to be done in Iran and then be sent to one of the three countries (Russia, France or America) for more enrichment.

The outcome, we can be sure, will be touted in Tehran as a victory — meaning, of course, a defeat for the other side. That’s the political context in which these talks operate. Future rounds probably won’t be much different. Actually reaching a grand bargain on all the issues dividing Iran and the West would deprive the Islamic revolution of any substance; forget it. These are nuclear talks, with perhaps some excursions into hostage negotiations. (There is precedent for goodwill gestures.) The real challenge before the P5+1 is to decide what it really wants most — Zero enrichment and reprocessing in Iran? Significantly strengthened safeguards? — and how to get there.

Hat tip: Anonymous Analyst.

Update. In his statement to the press today, ElBaradei returned to the theme of a grand bargain:

I very much hope that people see the big picture, see that this agreement could open the way for a complete normalization of relations between Iran and the international community.

It’s good to have a vision. But it’s also wiser to under-promise and over-deliver, rather than the other way around.

Comment [14]

The immediate advantages of last week’s agreement-in-principle between Iran and the P5+1 / E3+3 are pretty clear. Iran gets about five years’ worth of fuel for the Tehran Research Reactor (TRR). And removing 1,200 kg of Iran’s LEU and returning it as fuel takes away the much-discussed breakout option for the near term, as James was quick to note (see: Geneva: The TRR and Enrichment Abroad, October 1, 2009).

Nor does it seem that James’s concerns about possible molybdenum contamination in the LEU will prove an insurmountable obstacle. Mark Hibbs writes in the latest (October 5, 2009) issue of NuclearFuel that there are easy work-arounds:

Russia would have three options to supply fresh fuel for the TRR, P-5+1 officials said: enriching the Iranian EUP [enriched uranium product] to 19.75%; enriching Russian feedstock to that level; or blending down Russian high-enriched uranium, HEU, to 19.75%. The last two options could involve flag swaps of Iranian and Russian material, they said.

Whether the Iranians would agree to one of these alternatives remains to be seen; this issue might be cleared up at the next meeting, on October 18 19.

Downsides

From the Iranian perspective, the risk of finalizing and implementing the LEU deal is that the agreement might break down halfway through, stranding their EUP in Russia or France. So Geoff reminds us (see: A Primer on Iran’s Medical Reactor Plans, October 4, 2009).

From the P5+1 perspective, the main problem is that the arrangement does not satisfy the Security Council’s demand in UNSCR 1696 of 2006 — reaffirmed repeatedly, including just last month! — that Iran “suspend all enrichment-related and reprocessing activities.”

From the Iranian point of view, of course, this is an added advantage, as Saeed Jalili made clear:

“There was no discussion about the suspension of (Iran’s) nuclear activities,” Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) told reporter after he returned home from Geneva talks on Friday night.

The agreement also appears to require modification of UNSCR 1747 1737, which forbids Iranian nuclear exports. It does not seem to require any changes to the parts of UNSCR 1737 barring imports, since the “Bushehr loophole” would seem to cover TRR already: transfers of equipment and LEU fuel for LWRs are allowed. 19.75% enriched fuel just barely qualifies.

Worth It?

Is the advantage of getting most of Iran’s LEU stockpile out of the way worth the risk of not addressing the core issues at the outset? P5+1 officials can argue that they aren’t retreating from the suspension demand; after all, virtually all the sanctions that have followed from it will remain in place. Hibbs reports that the conditions that the P5+1 are likely to demand at this time “might include spent fuel takeback or in perpetuity safeguards.” (That last point would mean facility-specific safeguards that would remain in place even after an NPT withdrawal, on which see: Parallel Fuel Cycles, Revisited, September 30, 2009.) Those are pretty narrow conditions, more or less in keeping with the view of the senior U.S. official who called the LEU deal, in effect, just a first step on a long road:

So again, at least in our view, the research reactor proposal made by the IAEA would be a positive interim step to help build confidence so that we’d have more diplomatic space to pursue Iran’s compliance with its obligations under the Security Council Resolutions, the NPT and the IAEA, and to tackle the more fundamental question of Iran’s nuclear program.

We’re a long way from CVID, Toto.

Iran as North Korea

The idea of a stepwise approach raises the question of what makes for a mutually acceptable end state. The supply of fuel through Russia and France calls to mind North Korea’s demand for a LWR as a confidence-building measure under the ill-fated US-DPRK Agreed Framework of 1994 and the ill-fated Six-Party Talks. Indeed, one possibility would be to resurrect that general approach — under some other label, of course — by setting forth a larger program with multiple phases, in which the nuclear fuel cycle is gradually traded away for various political and security desiderata. But as we have seen, such arrangements are easily derailed by the profound lack of trust between the parties. Nor is there necessarily a solution space for this sort of deal to start with.

One could also envision a less ambitious program, a sort of halfway house that would help to achieve crucial regional security goals without quite ushering in the “grand bargain” of diplomatic dreams. Under this scenario, Iran would not suspend the operation of the nuclear fuel cycle, and sanctions would remain in place, but tensions would be reduced considerably by strengthened safeguards.

To extend the North Korea metaphor a little further, Iran today presents the West with a classic Kumchangri problem: there are some holes in the ground Over There, but how do you get inspectors in? According to the NY Times, intelligence agencies had spotted “more than a dozen suspect locations” as of a couple years ago, but didn’t necessarily have enough insight into their nature to be prepared to feed that information to the IAEA. (The Qom site was apparently on that list.) According to the same account, the P5+1 plans to demand that Iran adhere to the Additional Protocol, which would reduce a Kumchangri-type dilemma to a matter of routine (see: Be Careful What You Wish For, October 20, 2008). This could be a reasonable way for both sides to keep the pot from boiling over.

If you can’t quite envision that happening either, then perhaps it’s time to consider the multinational option (see: Paradox: Now is the Time to Deal, September 25, 2009).

Let’s conclude (finally) with a cautionary note. Last week brought two big surprises: first, the Qom revelation; second, the news that the LEU-for-TRR deal had been quietly under discussion for a few months prior to the Geneva talks. There may yet be other surprises pending.

Comment [7]