U.S. Presidents Donald Trump and Joe Biden both tried to reach a nuclear deal with the kingdom to share American technology. Nonproliferation experts warn any spinning centrifuges within Saudi Arabia could open the door to a possible weapons program for the kingdom, something its assertive crown prince has suggested he could pursue if Tehran obtains an atomic bomb.

Already, Saudi Arabia and nuclear-armed Pakistan signed a mutual defense pact last year after Israel launched an attack on Qatar targeting Hamas officials. Pakistan’s defense minister then said his nation’s nuclear program “will be made available” to Saudi Arabia if needed, something seen as a warning for Israel, long believed to be the Middle East’s only nuclear-armed state.

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Source: https://apnews.com/article/saudi-arabia-us-nuclear-enrichment-bomb-proliferation-18cb979f0abf5f0d81c1c91f45d6a6ef?fbclid=IwY2xjawQFp0BleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEeCbMlDhW7eEJQL_HLdmxT3TY5phaQ7H_luIl-3FGllXjI4vk9SCTRgqLnBIE_aem_1nAtub39zDqwrcv36knyqw

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But US President Donald Trump must first agree there can be no “military option”, Araghchi said, and added that Iran would “never accept coercion”.

He also insisted the negotiations in Oman would be indirect, contradicting Trump’s surprise announcement on Monday that they would be “direct talks”.

Trump, who pulled the US out of a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers during his first term, warned that Iran would be in “great danger” if talks were not successful.

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Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cd6j5l5w1lxo

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Iranian announcement to further scale back its commitment to the 2015 nuclear deal was met with unease in Israel as both the prime minister and the energy minister called on the European powers to impose new sanctions on Tehran

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday called an announced increase of Iranian uranium enrichment a “very, very dangerous step,” and urged the European powers to impose automatic sanctions on the Islamic Republic.

Iranian officials earlier on Sunday said the country would further scale back its commitment to the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, including ramping up the level of uranium enrichment beyond the 3.67% permitted under the agreement.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (Photo: AFP)

“Iran has violated its solemn promise under the U.N. Security Council not to enrich uranium beyond a certain level,” Netanyahu said at the onset of the weekly cabinet meeting. “I call on my friends, the heads of France, Britain, and Germany – you signed this deal and you said that as soon as they take this step, severe sanctions will be imposed – that was the Security Council resolution. Where are you?”

“The enrichment of uranium is made for one reason and one reason only – it’s for the creation of atomic bombs,” added the prime minister.

Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz described earlier on Sunday described the increase in uranium enrichment levels as “moderate” but accused Tehran of breaking out of internationally agreed limitations on its nuclear projects and moving towards a potential bomb.

“Iran has begun – while it is a moderate rise right now – but it has begun to raise, to break out of the uranium enrichment curbs that were imposed on it,” Steinitz, a member of Netanyahu’s security cabinet, said in an interview with Ynet.

“It means … that it is brushing off the red lines that were agreed (and) that it has begun its march, a march that is not simple, toward nuclear weaponry.”

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani (Photo: AFP)

Iran’s deputy foreign minister also added that his nation will take another step impacting its compliance with its 2015 agreement in 60 days. Abbas Araghchi told a news conference Sunday that he cannot elaborate now on the nature of the next step.

The biggest obstacle to producing nuclear weapons is obtaining enough fissile material – weapons-grade highly enriched uranium or plutonium – for the bomb’s core.

The 2015 deal caps the level of purity to which Iran can enrich uranium hexafluoride, the feedstock for centrifuges, at 3.67%, far below the 90% of weapons-grade. It is also well below the 20% level to which Iran enriched uranium before the deal. The 3.67% cap lasts 15 years.

Source: https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5545144,00.html

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A view of the heavy-water production plant in the central Iranian town of Arak, August 26, 2006. (AP/ ISNA, Arash Khamoushi)

Iran will on Sunday announce an increase in uranium enrichment to five percent, in a breach of its commitments to the 2015 nuclear deal, further stoking tensions with Washington and putting more pressure on the European states that support the accord.

“The main announcement tomorrow will be the increase of the level of enrichment to 5% percent from 3.67% that we agreed under the deal,” an Iranian official told the Reuters news agency on condition of anonymity.

Ali Akbar Velayati, international affairs adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said earlier that the uranium enrichment “will increase as much as needed for our peaceful activities.”

“For Bushehr nuclear reactor we need five percent enrichment and it is a completely peaceful goal,” he said in an interview published Friday on the leader’s official website.

Iranian presidential candidate Ali Akbar Velayati, a former foreign minister, walks past a portrait of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei at the conclusion of his press conference in Tehran, Iran, Monday, June 3, 2013. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

He also accused the US and European states of violating the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), as the nuclear accord is known.

Iran breached a uranium stockpile limit set by the deal last week.

Under the atomic accord, Iran agreed to enrich uranium to no more than 3.67%, which is enough for peaceful pursuits but is far below weapons-grade levels of 90%. However, the closer it gets to 20% the less time it will need to break out to a bomb.

Iran denies it seeks nuclear weapons, but the nuclear deal sought to prevent that as a possibility by limiting enrichment and Iran’s stockpile of uranium to 300 kilograms (661 pounds).

Iran said Saturday that it would officially announce the steps cutting its commitments to the 2015 nuclear deal on Sunday morning, the day is set for Europe to offer new terms for the accord after the US withdrew and put punishing economic sanctions on the Islamic Republic.

Iran’s senior nuclear negotiator, Abbas Araqchi, will announce the cuts in a news conference Sunday at 10:30 a.m. local time, the semi-official Fars news agency said.

The UK, France, and Germany have yet to offer a way for Iran to avoid the sweeping economic sanctions imposed by US President Donald Trump since he pulled the United States out of the JCPOA a year ago, especially those targeting its crucial oil sales.

In response to the spiraling tensions and war of words with Iran, the US has rushed thousands of troops, an aircraft carrier, nuclear-capable B-52 bombers and advanced fighter jets to the Mideast. Mysterious oil tanker attacks near the Strait of Hormuz, strikes by Iranian-backed rebels in Yemen on Saudi Arabia, and Iran shooting down a US military drone have raised fears of a wider conflict engulfing the region.

A US military helicopters take part in an air power demonstration next to the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier in the Arabian Sea, July 4, 2019. (US Navy/Jeff Sherman)

On Wednesday, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said Tehran would increase its enrichment of uranium to “any amount that we want” beginning Sunday.

On Monday, Iran and United Nations inspectors acknowledged it had broken the stockpile limit. Combining that with increasing its enrichment levels narrows the one-year window experts believe Iran would need to have enough material to build a nuclear weapon if it chose to do so.

The UN’s nuclear watchdog said Friday that it would hold an emergency meeting on Iran’s nuclear program on July 10.

The meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s board of governors was announced following a US request.

Iran insists that it is not violating the JCPOA, citing terms of the agreement allowing one side to temporarily abandon some of the commitments if it deems the other side is not respecting its part of the accord.

President Hassan Rouhani speaks in a cabinet meeting in Tehran, Iran, July 3, 2019. (Iranian Presidency Office via AP)

Rouhani stressed that Iran’s breach of the stockpile limit would be reversed if the other parties to the nuclear deal made good on their side of the bargain — relief from sanctions.

Rouhani said Iran will also deliver on its threat to resume construction of a heavy water reactor after July 7 and will bring it to the condition that “according to you, is dangerous and can produce plutonium.”

Trump had warned Monday that Iran is “playing with fire” after Tehran said it had exceeded the limit set on its enriched uranium stockpile.

But Rouhani said it was the US that started the fire and Washington has to “put it out” by returning to the nuclear deal.

Source: https://www.timesofisrael.com/iran-to-announce-it-is-increasing-nuclear-enrichment-to-5-sunday/

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