New Delhi: On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump wrote in a post on his social media platform Truth Social: “IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON. I said it over and over again!” The post comes amid raging war between Iran and Israel, which has so far claimed more than 400 lives in the last five days. It reflects that US is trying every attempt to stop Iran from increasing its nuclear arsenal and making a nuclear bomb.
There are also reports that Trump has offered to broker a ceasefire between the two warring countries. Reuters has reported that Tehran has urged Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Oman to prod US President Donald Trump to use his influence and press Israel to agree to an immediate ceasefire with it, in exchange for Iran showing flexibility in nuclear talks.
Israel’s attack on Iran
Despite this, there seems to be no de-escalation in the Iran-Israel war, as both rivals continue to pound each other with airstrikes. The conflict started when Israel struck more than 100 key targets in Iran on Friday, including nuclear facilities and missile sites. It also killed senior military commanders and nuclear scientists. The Israeli government said the strikes were a “preventive” move, aimed to stop what it saw as an immediate and certain threat that Iran was about to build a nuclear bomb.
In an address, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the attack – called Operation Rising Lion – targeted “the heart” of Iran’s nuclear programme. He pointed out that “if not stopped, Iran could produce a nuclear weapon in a very short time. It could be a year. It could be within a few months”.
The Israeli military said it had collected information showing that Iran had made huge progress in trying to make parts for a nuclear bomb. This includes a uranium metal core and a special device to trigger the nuclear explosion.
Israel has also asserted that a report released by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on June 12, which flayed Iran for breaching its promises under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) until the early 2000s, indicated that there is a serious and urgent threat. Even though these claims are yet to be corroborated, last week, the IAEA had said in its latest report that Iran had gathered enough uranium enriched to 60% purity to possibly make nine nuclear bombs.
Iran alleged that the IAEA was colluding with the “Zionist entity”. Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi has criticised what he called Israel’s “reckless” attacks on his country’s “peaceful nuclear facilities”.
Iran’s nuclear plan
Iran has been contending that its nuclear programme is only for peaceful purposes and that it has never ever tried to make a nuclear bomb.
IAEA had found proof that Iran carried out “a range of activities relevant to the development of a nuclear explosive device” from the late 1980s until 2003. However, after 2009, there are no credible indications that it continued with these activities.
In 2015, the Obama administration, together with China, France, the UK, Russia, and Germany, negotiated the nuclear deal with Iran known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). Tehran also permitted monitoring by the IAEA’s inspectors in exchange for lifting of sanctions. Restrictions were put on production of enriched uranium. The Iranians agreed to bring down their nuclear stockpiles and reduce the uranium enrichment level to 3.67%.
In 2018, Trump called off the deal as he claimed that it was not enough to deter Iran from making a nuclear bomb. US sanctions were back again. Iran abandoned the deal’s enrichment limits as a show of its disappointment. It was in 2021 that Iran restarted enriching uranium to 20% purity.
On Thursday, for the first time since 2006, the Board of Governors of the UN nuclear watchdog resolved by vote that Iran’s nuclear programme had breached the terms of a 1974 agreement.
