The Islamic Republic has pointedly barred IAEA professional inspectors from Arak, but is now inviting political ambassadors to visit the site.
Acting Foreign Minister Ali-Akbar Salehi said the invitations to the ambassadors were in line with Iran’s policy of transparency.
Majlis Deputy Esmail Kowsari said the invitations showed Iran’s “sincerity.” PressTV, the government’s English language news outlet, also quoted him as saying: “Europeans know they will be condemned by world public opinion if they visit Iran’s nuclear facilities and this is why they have turned down the invitation.” That curious comment appeared aimed at saving face with the Iranian public over the rejection by portraying the West as cowardly, but it also showed the West as confronting a strong anti-Iranian streak in Western public opinion.
Catherine Ashton last week visited Hungary, which currently holds the presidency of the EU and was one of the countries invited to visit. She said she consulted with Russia and China before deciding that the EU should reject the invitation.
“It’s not our job,” she said. “Looking at the sites and establishing what they are requires expertise.”
On Tuesday, Russian Deputy Foeign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Russia had not yet made a decision whether to accept the Iranian invitation.
The Islamic Republic last week sent invitations to at least nine countries and the Arab League to send their ambassadors to the IAEA to Iran to visit the two nuclear sites January 15-16. The countries known to have been invited were Russia, China, Cuba, Venezuela, Brazil, Turkey, Algeria, Egypt as chair of the Non-Aligned Movement and Hungary as president of the EU for the first half of 2011.
The Iran Times last week cited the German news agency as reporting that, after criticism that Germany, Britain, France and the United States had not been invited, Iran reversed itself and sent invitations to those four as well. However that Deutsche Presse Agentur report proved to be erroneous.
As of the Iran Times’ deadline this week, no country had publicly announced its acceptance of the invitation. Western diplomats in Vienna, the IAEA headquarters, told Reuters last week that Russia and China were being lobbied heavily by the Western powers to reject the invitation.
The Big Six powers—China, Russia, Germany, France, Britain and the United States—are to meet with Iran to discuss its nuclear program January 21-22 in Istanbul, continuing the talks that began last month in Geneva.
Salehi announced last week that Iran now has 40 kilograms of uranium enriched to 20 percent, an increase from the 30 kilos announced in October. Salehi said Iran expected to have enough 20 percent uranium fashioned into fuel plates to be able to refuel the Tehran reactor, which requires fuel enriched to 19.75 percent, in September.
Salehi warned the Big Six, “The more they delay the talks, we will move forward. After some time, the issue of the fuel swap will be meaningless.”
The fuel swap was first proposed by Russia, France and the United States in October 2009. Iran rejected the initial proposal and suggested several modifications that never met the other countries’ approval.
