January 17-2014
Following are the main components of the nuclear agreement reached by Iran and the Big Six in November and due to go into effect Monday.
Duration: This is an interim, temporary agreement meant to allow time in which to reach a more comprehensive agreement. This agreement is to last six months, to July 20, but is “renewable by mutual consent,” a provision that bothers some who fear Iran will drag its feet and try constantly renewing this agreement.
IRANIAN CONCESSIONS
Enrichment: Iran may not enrich beyond 5 percent—that is, it will halt all current enrichment up to 20 percent as of Monday. It will not build any new locations for enrichment during the six months. The agreement does not say anything about a “right to enrich,” as claimed by Iran. However, this agreement says that the future agreement to be negotiated will provide parameters for an enrichment program, effectively conceding now that Iran will be allowed to enrich in the future. The administration has refused to accept Iran’s argument that all countries have a “right to enrich” for fear that could encourage others to enrich.
Current 20% stocks: Half of the uranium now enriched to 20 percent will be retained for future use in fuel for the Tehran Research Reactor, which requires 20 percent enriched fuel. The other half will be diluted by adding other uranium so that this stock will be no more than 5 percent enriched. This will leave Iran with about 40 percent as much uranium enriched to 20 percent, as it would need to build one nuclear weapon.
Future 5% stocks: All new uranium enriched up to 5 percent during the six-month period will be converted to uranium oxide, so it cannot readily be used later for weapons purposes although it will usable as fuel for power reactors.
Centrifuges: Iran now has about 20,000 centrifuges installed, half enriching and half sitting idle. Iran may not add to that number. It may not enrich with the unused centrifuges. It can replace any centrifuges in use that break down with a centrifuge of the same type. But those replacement centrifuges are the only centrifuges Iran will manufacture during the six months. Iran is currently enriching only with its old IR-1 design and the agreement doesn’t allow it to use any newer and more efficient designs.
Arak heavy water reactor: This site is under construction for installation of a reactor that can make plutonium, another material that can be used to make weapons. The agreement says Iran will “make no further advances” at Arak, implying, but not actually saying, that construction will halt. The US has not clarified that wording, but it appears Iran will be able to do ordinary non-nuclear construction at the plant. Crucially, the agreement says Iran will not produce any more fuel assemblies for Arak. It has currently made 11 of the 150 assemblies Arak is designed to hold. This is a major restriction that will slow progress at Arak. The agreement also says Iran will not install any reactor components at Arak.
R&D Work on more modern centrifuges: This was a major issue in the technical talks of the past two months. The November agreement says very vaguely: “Iran will continue its safeguarded [i.e., under IAEA inspection] R&D [Research and Development] practices, including its current enrichment R&D practices, which are not designed for accumulation of the enriched uranium.” The State Department said Monday that means Iran may work only on the centrifuge designs it was working on in November—IR-1, IR-2m, IR-4, IR-5 and IR-6—and can only do the types of activities that the IAEA wrote in its November report were being conducted then. It conceded that Iran could do any research on paper that it wished, but could not bend metal in any new ways. “They can continue what they’ve been doing, but they can’t go beyond that,” a State Department official said in a briefing for reporters.
Additional Protocol: The Additional Protocol is an agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) allowing the IAEA to make intrusive inspections at sites where it suspects nuclear work may be underway. Iran approved the Additional Protocol a decade ago, but then abrogated it. This temporary agreement says that after the next-stage agreement is reached Iran will “ratify and implement” the Additional Protocol. But it does not apply during the interim agreement.
Modified Code 3.1: This is a major issue for the IAEA. It requires early reporting of nuclear plans to the IAEA. Iran unilaterally abrogated the Code 3.1 agreement years ago. The agreement in November is silent on Code 3.1 but does obligate Iran to provide the IAEA with some of information required under Code 3.1. There have been no reports about any reference to Code 3.1 in the technical talks.
Inspections: A Joint Commission of the seven countries will be established to monitor compliance. Iran agrees to allow IAEA inspectors to have daily access to the enrichment plants at Natanz and Fordo. This addresses the concern of some analysts that, under the present inspection system, the IAEA might not detect a major violation for a week. The new agreement will also allow inspectors to visit all shops where centrifuges are made and assembled and all uranium mines.
WESTERN CONCESSIONS
New sanctions: There will be no new UN, US or EU sanctions for the six months of the agreement. Implicit is that President Obama will veto any sanctions enacted by Congress that would take effect during the six months.
Oil sanctions: The United States will not lean on the countries that currently buy oil from Iran to further reduce their purchases during the six months. The US sanctions waivers for those countries normally require that countries promise a further “significant reduction” in each six-month period. For the duration of the nuclear deal, however, the United States will only insist that purchasing countries not buy more Iranian oil than in the previous six months.
Frozen assets: Iran will be allowed to repatriate $4.2 billion in assets out of approximately $50 billion sitting in banks abroad. (This figure does not appear in the text, but was given later to reporters.) Iran can currently use that money, but only to buy goods in the countries where the money is lodged—Japan, South Korea, China, India and Turkey. Now it will be able to spend the money for other purposes. Note that with the oil sanctions remaining in place, Iran is expected to continue to lose more than $1 billion per week as a result of reduced oil sales.
Other sanctions: The US and EU will suspend for the six months their sanctions on: 1) sales by Iran of petrochemicals; 2) gold and precious metals sales to Iran; 3) the auto industry, which has suffered immensely because it cannot get components from Europe and South Korea, and 4) spare parts for Iran’s passenger planes. Additional petrochemical sales will be a moneymaker for Iran—but won’t come anywhere near making up for the lost oil sales. The White House said the additional sales allowed here would earn Iran about $1.5 billion over six months. (The White House said Iran would gain $7 billion in total sanctions relief over the six months of the deal—$4.2 billion from frozen assets, $1.5 billion from petrochemical sales, but gave no explanation for the remaining $1.3 billion.) Mark Dubowitz of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies disputes the $7 billion calculation and puts the benefit to Iran at $20 billion—much higher but still a long distance from the $30 billion in lost oil sales. This issue does not appear to have been addressed in the technical talks.
Humanitarian goods: A new “financial channel” will be created so Iran can more easily buy foodstuffs and medical goods and make $400 million in tuition payments for government-sponsored students directly to foreign universities. The agreement says this channel can use Iranian “oil revenues held abroad,” implying that this will free up more than the $4.2 billion cited above.
End to nuclear sanctions: This six-month agreement says the future comprehensive agreement will end with the lifting of all UN, US and EU sanctions “related to Iran’s nuclear program.” But the EU and US have imposed some sanctions for human rights violations, for terrorism activities and for Iran’s support of Syria. And the original November 1979 sanctions that are renewed each year by the US president have nothing to do with the nuclear program. The agreement says nothing about the possibility of new sanctions being imposed on Iran for human rights or other considerations. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenehi has frequently warned that if the nuclear issue were to go away the Americans would just shift their focus to something else, like human rights.