TEHRAN -- Iran has “resolved” one of three cases raised by the UN nuclear agency, media reports said Tuesday.
The reports came just days before the board of governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency is due to meet to review progress in addressing the agency’s remaining questions.
The IAEA had reported the discovery of alleged traces of radioactive material at three sites not declared by Iran as having hosted past nuclear activity.
“With the improvement of interactions between Iran and the IAEA... the case related to one of the agency’s alleged sites -- Abadeh -- has been resolved,” Iran’s Fars news agency reported.
“This concludes the agency’s inquiry into one of the three alleged locations raised,” it added.
The Marivan site in Abadeh county in the southern province of Fars is the first of the three sites to be addressed under a work plan agreed by Iran and the IAEA in March last year.
The other two sites are Varamin and Turquzabad.
The IAEA’s questions about the sites are one of the remaining issues plaguing efforts to revive the 2015 nuclear deal, which was left in tatters by the unilateral withdrawal of the United States in 2018.
Fars also reported that Iran had addressed IAEA questions about the discovery of uranium enriched to 83.7 percent purity.
Iran said the enrichment of the sample to 83.7 percent was likely due to “unintended fluctuations” in the enrichment process as it had never set out to enrich uranium to more than 60 percent.
Iran has strongly ruled out any ambition to develop a nuclear weapons capability, insisting its activities are entirely peaceful.
Last September, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, Muhammad Eslami, strongly rejected all IAEA accusations,
including about the existence of undeclared nuclear activities or material in Iran.
“There are no undeclared nuclear activities or material in Iran. All accusations are merely based on fake and incorrect information provided by the usurping regime of Israel,” he said.
In a meeting with IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi here in March, President Ebrahim Raisi said Iran expects the IAEA to adopt a “professional and fair” approach to its nuclear energy program and refrain from being affected by certain powers which are pursuing their own specific goals.
In February, AEOI spokesman Behrouz Kamalvandi complained that the IAEA publicizes confidential reports about Iran’s nuclear activities even before investigations are complete in order to prepare the ground for fabrications against the country’s peaceful nuclear program.
He also criticized the IAEA for allowing the correspondence between Tehran and the agency to leak to the press.