Family Security Matters
George Jahn, a respected reporter who covers the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna for The Associated Press, published an important story yesterday on details of a secret side agreement to the Iran nuclear deal in which Iran will collect samples of possible nuclear-weapons-related activity for the IAEA. He wrote his story after an unnamed diplomat allowed him to read a draft of one of the side deals. The side-deal documents reportedly have only been briefed to U.S. officials and will not be shared with the U.S. Congress.
I wrote on this website on July 22 that Senator Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) and Representative Mike Pompeo (R., Kan.) learned about the existence of two secret side deals to the Iran agreement when they met with IAEA officials in Vienna on July 17. The congressmen were told these agreements concerned resolving the possible military dimensions of Iran’s nuclear program and the issue of access to the Parchin military base, where explosive testing related to nuclear-warhead development reportedly has taken place.
This story attracted more attention on July 23, when Senator James Risch (R., Idaho) revealed during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing that one of the side deals allows Iran to collect samples for the IAEA. Risch learned about this from Obama-administration officials during a classified briefing the previous day and indicated he was told that the IAEA would, by video, remotely monitor the Iranians taking samples. Risch’s remarks created quite a stir at the hearing and led Senator Robert Menendez (D., N.J.) to say that if this were true, it would amount to “the equivalent of the fox guarding the chicken coop.” Senator Bob Corker (R., Tenn.), the committee’s chairman, likened this arrangement to NFL players’ mailing in their own urine samples for drug testing.
Jahn’s story is important because it provides previously unknown details of how Iran will collect samples for the IAEA. These details include the following:
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