The IAEA released its latest Safeguards Report on Iran’s nuclear program today, following up a shorter statement released last week. The report confirms that Iran has begun to enrich uranium at a level of 20 percent at its Pilot Fuel Enrichment Plant (PFEP) at Natanz.

On 14 February 2010, Iran, in the presence of Agency inspectors, moved approximately 1950 kg of low enriched UF6 from [its Fuel Enrichment Plant] to the PFEP feed station. The Agency inspectors sealed the cylinder containing the material to the feed station. Iran provided the Agency with mass spectrometry results which indicate that enrichment levels of up to 19.8% U-235 were obtained at PFEP between 9 and 11 February 2010.

To explain why it is much faster and easier for Iran to go from 20 percent to 90 percent enriched uranium, which would be required to produce a bomb, than from 5 percent to 20 percent, I defer to a true Arms Control Wonk.

Essentially, though, Iran has moved nearly its entire stock of LEU to PFEP, where a single cascade is currently producing 20 percent enriched uranium for the Tehran Research Reactor (TRR).  “‘This is way more than the TRR needs and raises concerns about why Iran would be planning to convert so much’ of its low enriched uranium stockpile to higher enriched uranium,” says Jacqueline Shire of ISIS to Laura Rozen at POLITICO.

Further, the report notes that:

Contrary to the relevant resolutions of the Board of Governors and the Security Council, Iran has also continued with the construction of the IR-40 reactor and related heavy water activities. The Agency has not been permitted to take samples of the heavy water which is stored at UCF, and has not been provided with access to the Heavy Water Production Plant.

Before centrifuge technology for enriching uranium became available, the plutonium route using heavy-water reactors was the common choice for aspiring nuclear weapons states. India’s Cirrus reactor, Pakistan’s Khushab reactor, and Israel’s Dimona reactor are all large, heavy-water reactors. Since Iran’s civil nuclear power program is based on light-water technology, the use of a heavy-water production facility and a heavy-water “research” reactor have caused many experts to take note.

Iran has ignored multiple IAEA requests to cease its heavy-water program at Arak and previously refused an offer by France, Germany, and the United Kingdom to replace its 40-megawatt heavy-water reactor with a light-water research reactor.

In response to the implications of these combined current activities, the IAEA has stated its “concerns” for the first time:

The information available to the Agency in connection with these outstanding issues is extensive and has been collected from a variety of sources over time. It is also broadly consistent and credible in terms of the technical detail, the time frame in which the activities were conducted and the people and organizations involved. Altogether, this raises concerns about the possible existence in Iran of past or current undisclosed activities related to the development of a nuclear payload for a missile.

This change may have been partially influenced by the leadership of Yukiya Amano, who became IAEA head in December, since the report appears to be more directly critical of Iran’s refusal to cooperate with the IAEA than most issued under his predecessor, Mohamed ElBaradei.

Less than a week after declaring to the international community that Iran was increasing its uranium enrichment from 3.5 to 20 percent, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stated that the efforts were successful and that Iran should be considered among the nuclear countries of the world.  

Making his declaration at an event in Azadi Square in Tehran to commemorate the thirty-first anniversary of the Islamic Revolution, Ahmadinejad insisted that the uranium enriched to 20% was for peaceful purposes.  “The Iranian nation is brave enough that if one day we wanted to build nuclear bombs, we would announce it publicly without being afraid of you,” he told the crowd assembled for the observation of the anniversary.  

Uranium enriched to 20% U235 is considered highly enriched uranium that could be further enriched with relative ease to make a nuclear weapon.  Iran claims that the enriched uranium will be used in a research reactor to produce medical isotopes.  Tehran backed away from an earlier international offer to further enrich its low-enriched uranium outside the country, raising concerns that Iran’s intentions may not be as benign as it is making them out to be…

There is consensus among nuclear experts that, while Iran does have the capacity to enrich uranium to 20%, the amount that could have been produced by the time of Ahmadinejad’s announcement is negligible.  The International Atomic Energy Commission suggested that Iran’s increased enrichment efforts are only modest to this point, though David Albright of the Institute for Science and International Security suggested that at the rate Iran plans to produce 20%-HEU, it may have enough HEU in three years to further enrich enough material for one nuclear weapon.

The announcement of Iran’s intention to increase the level of uranium enrichment, and the later claims of success, was met with an announcement by the United States Treasury Department of further “smart sanctions” against a handful of Iranian construction companies affiliated with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard allegedly involved in weapons production and trade.

There is also talk of a fourth round of sanctions by the United Nations Security Council.  Russia — which has historically been less enthusiastic about sanctions than the United States, the United Kingdom, and France — has indicated that they might support further sanctions.  The international community seems increasingly dubious of Iran’s denial of intent to develop a nuclear bomb.  However, China remains reluctant to impose new sanctions and may thwart attempts by the UN Security Council to tighten the economic sanctions imposed on Iran.

In light of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran’s sudden announcement of scaling up mere days before the anniversary of the Islamic Revolution, one cannot help but wonder if Ahmadinejad’s triumphant proclamation was an attempt to flex muscle to an increasingly vocal and active opposition and an international community sympathetic to the anti-government activists and increasingly distrustful of the aims of Iran’s nuclear program.  

All steps adopted by the United States and the international community should be careful to avoid undermining the pro-democracy opposition movement in Iran. The international community should continue strong and active diplomatic engagement with Iran, and impose sanctions only so long as they are targeted and designed to minimize the burden on the civilian population.  Calls for aggression and military intervention should be turned aside; the consequences of such escalation on both the stability and security of the region and on the civilian population would be catastrophic.

At the same time, the international community must continue to implore Iran to be more transparent with the IAEA about its intentions and grant it greater access to suspected nuclear-related information and facilities.  Iran should know that its plans to increase enrichment will only increase concerns over its nuclear program, especially since it rejected an earlier international offer to further enrich its low-enriched uranium in France and Russia.

Patience, careful monitoring and involvement by the International Atomic Energy Agency, and persistent diplomatic engagement by Western powers will not guarantee success but is the only sensible option to try to block Iran’s nuclear weapons plans.

On Sunday, an angry Iran refused to comply with a demand by the IAEA to cease work on its Qom nuclear fuel enrichment plant.  The resolution, which President Ahmadinejad now calls, “illegal,” criticized Iran for defying its obligations under multiple UN Security Council requirements and rebuked the country for its secret uranium enrichment activities near the city of Qom.  Iran further escalated the confrontation by declaring it would construct 10 more such plants.

This threat has created speculation in the blogosphere, but is it bluster or a realistic possibility?

Although the ability of Iran to deliver on all 10 sites seems questionable at best, Joshua Pollack at Arms Control Wonk speculates that secret plans to build new facilities may have been in place for some time, with construction already underway:

One way to see it, then, is that the Iranian side has seized the opportunity to get tough by coming clean, or to come clean by getting tough.  In the two-level game of international diplomacy and Iranian domestic politics, this sort of Janus-faced response may be as close to a win-win outcome as ever happens.

Adding fuel to this fire, the U.S. National Intelligence Estimate in 2007 “listed more than a dozen suspect locations” for nuclear weapons facilities in Iran.

While the Washington Times and the Wall Street Journal ready themselves for military strikes, Max Bergmann at the Wonk Room notes that the Bush administration’s previous refusal to engage Iran prevented an international consensus from emerging.  

The IAEA’s vote to censure Iran was not only “symbolic,” it represents a rare measure of unity within the group.  Moscow and Beijing have not previously been on board with efforts to punish Iran for its nuclear defiance, either acting to prevent new Security Council measures or pushing for lighter sanctions.  Bergmann notes that:

While Obama has been engaging Iran, he has also been working to significantly strengthen the international community’s stance on sanctions should the Iranians walk away.  The US and Europe, which were frequently at odds during the Bush administration, are now largely in sync.

The resolution was endorsed by six world powers — the U.S., Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany.  Only Cuba, Venezuela and Malaysia voted against the document.

A vote on the resolution is expected to take place Friday.  If the resolution is adopted, it will be transmitted to the Security Council for further action, a move that has not taken place since 2006.  The IAEA’s 2006 censure of Iran increased initial public speculation as to the nature of the country’s nuclear program and prompted another four UN Security Council resolutions, three of them with sanctions.  This second referral may likewise signal the beginning of more serious action toward Iran.