VIENNA: Western strategists have long debated the spectre of Iran “breaking out” – suddenly showing the ability to explode an atom bomb. But some see a “sneak-out” less visible to UN inspectors as a possibly bigger risk and world powers have calibrated their demands in negotiations with Iran to forestall any such outcome.
Under a “sneak-out” scenario, Western officials and experts say, Iran could build a uranium enrichment plant in secret to make bomb material unbeknownst to the U.N. nuclear watchdog, now empowered to visit only Tehran’s declared nuclear sites.
To counter this risk, they say, any breakthrough diplomatic settlement with Iran must grant the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) broader surveillance powers in this vast country crisscrossed by remote, often inaccessible mountains and desert.
“Under current circumstances, I believe that a ‘sneak-out’ from an undeclared enrichment facility is more a likely threat than a ‘break-out’ from a declared facility,” said Gary Samore, until last year the top nuclear proliferation expert on U.S. President Barack Obama’s national security staff.
A U.S. National Intelligence Estimate in 2007 offered a similar view, saying the Islamic Republic “probably would use covert facilities … for the production of highly enriched uranium for a weapon”, if it were to pursue nuclear arms.
Iran, with which six big powers resumed talks on the fringes of the UN General Assembly last week, says it is refining uranium only to lower levels for a future network of nuclear power stations. It rejects Western suspicions that its ultimate, underlying goal is high-enriched uranium for nuclear bombs. A nuclear “break-out” is usually defined as amassing sufficient weapons-grade uranium for one bomb. (PTI)
