IAEA Chief Rafael Mariano Grossi held a press conference on Monday to brief journalists about developments related to the IAEA’s monitoring and verification work in Iran.
Grossi said that today he had a long discussion with Dr. Salehi, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, and they were able to agree on two issues.
The agreement is related to the temporary bilateral technical agreement that Iran and IAEA reached in Tehran in February, he added, saying that the information collected by their technical equipment at various locations in Tehran will continue to be stored.
The second case is that the equipment, verification and monitoring activities that Iran and the Agency agreed on will continue for a month from now and will expire on June 24, 2021, Grossi said.
IAEA chief went on to say that if this agreement was important in February, it is more important now than it was then because since February until now, many activities have been carried out in Iran, both qualitatively and quantitatively.
Grossi also said that in addition to the general parameters he presented in the February joint statement, they have a number of technical documents detailing the locations where they have installed cameras, flow meters, and online electronics systems to record the enrichment that takes place there.
Regarding the restriction of the Agency's access to the recorded information, Grossi said that the Agency's access is not as strong as it was in the JCPOA and the Additional Protocol and the information [camera recordings] will not be delivered to the Agency for another month.
IAEA chief also noted that one of the things the two sides agreed on in February was that at the end of the deadline of the agreement between Iran and the IAEA, the information on the technical equipment would be cleared, which would not happen right now.
The Agency's verification and monitoring activities have been and continue to be as usual, Grossi said, adding that the Agency knows about the equipment and their locations and has its own estimates and calculations of what is happening.
In response to a question about the possibility of the conditional extension of the previous agreement between Iran and the IAEA for a month, he said that the Agency does not accept any conditions for the implementation of its obligations, authorities and activities.
The Agency has certain obligations and authorities, and the agreement reached is definitely not conditional, he added.
Regarding the effect of the Iranian presidential election process on the continuation of Iran's cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency, Grossi said that he is not worried, and he is sure the next Iranian government will continue to work with the IAEA.
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