
IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi met with Iran’s Chief of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran Mohamed Eslami during a bilateral meeting at the IAEA 65th General Conference held in Vienna. 20 September 2021. Image credit: IAEA Imagebank
The following is an excerpt from the full piece published by The National Interest.
By Bijan Ahmadi
After the recent report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Iran’s nuclear program, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States is fast approaching the critical point when a return to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) would no longer produce the non-proliferation outcome the original deal anticipated. The last-minute meetings in Tehran between the IAEA director-general and Iranian officials have addressed the nuclear watchdog’s immediate concerns concerning their monitoring equipment and averted a crisis that could derail diplomatic negotiations over the JCPOA. However, the mutual distrust and complexity of disagreements between Tehran and Washington have made a compromise to revive the JCPOA difficult. Despite the challenges, a diplomatic solution is still the least costly option for both countries, not to mention Iran’s neighbors in the Middle East.
Bijan Ahmadi (@AhmadiBijanFA) is the Executive Director and founding member of the Institute for Peace & Diplomacy (IPD).