Behind Iran's doubletalk the nuclear threat is real

Do not be fooled by Iran’s claims that positive steps are being taken to resolve the stand-off with the West over its nuclear programme.

Through more than a decade of tortuous talks, Iran’s negotiators have proved themselves to be cunning practitioners in the art of deceit. On far too many occasions they have left the negotiating table promising to undertake one course of action, only to do the opposite once back in the sanctuary of Tehran.

Thus when Saeed Jalili, Iran’s chief negotiator, claimed this week that Iran was “looking positively” at the West’s attempts to resolve the nuclear saga, his words should be taken with an enormous pinch of salt. Last time the Iranians made such promises, at Geneva in 2010, diplomats from the “P5+1” — the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council plus Germany — left the conference room in the confident belief that they had struck a deal to resolve the controversy over Iran’s nuclear ambitions. The deal specified that Iran would freeze its uranium enrichment programme, which most intelligence officials are convinced is part of a clandestine plan to build an atom bomb. In return the West would ease sanctions that have crippled the Iranian economy.

The enticing prospect of that deal lasted for as long as it took for the Iranian delegation to return to Tehran, whereupon their political masters promptly refused to endorse the agreement. It transpired that the Iranians had deliberately strung out negotiations to buy themselves time to produce sufficient quantities of enriched uranium for a nuclear warhead.

As another round of talks got under way this week in Kazakhstan, it seems the Iranians are still up to their old tricks. For at the same time that Jalili was hailing the prospect of a compromise, the Daily Telegraph published satellite images showing that Iran was well-advanced in its attempts to develop another kind of atom bomb, one made of plutonium rather than uranium. As in most states that have developed home-grown nuclear weapons, such as India and North Korea, Iran’s scientists have taken care not to invest all their options in one nuclear basket. Rather than concentrating their energies on producing a warhead made from enriched uranium, they have simultaneously used the Arak heavy-water facility to undertake research on building a plutonium device.

For 18 months teams of international inspectors have been denied access to this facility, which experts believe has the potential to produce sufficient plutonium to make an atomic bomb. So the publication of satellite images that clearly show it is fully operational should be enough to give all of us sleepless nights. The Iranians will no doubt offer their usual excuses, namely that research carried out at Arak is for peaceful purposes, such as making medical equipment. If so, why not let the inspectors visit the plant and satisfy themselves — and the world — that there is nothing sinister taking place? Otherwise there will come a time when the West runs out of patience and the mullahs will face their day of reckoning.

Con Coughlin is the author of Khomeini’s Ghost (Pan Macmillan).