The United States, France, the United Kingdom and Germany denounced on Friday that Iran responded in an “inappropriate” manner to a call for attention from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) about an undeclared technical modification in its nuclear program.
The UN agency, tasked with verifying the peaceful nature of nuclear activities, drew Tehran’s attention on Wednesday after noting a previously unreported change in its mode of operation to enrich uranium to 60% at the Fordo underground plant.
Iran said it was a “mistake” by an IAEA inspector.
“Iran’s claims that these actions stem from a mistake are inadequate,” Washington, Paris, London and Berlin responded in a statement.
“Iran’s actions are judged on the basis of objective and impartial IAEA reports, not on the basis of its presumed intentions,” they added.
The agency claims to have “detected during a surprise visit on January 21 that two cascades of centrifuges were interconnected in significantly different ways.”
Western countries considered that this modification was “inconsistent with Iran’s obligations” and that “this lack of prior notification compromised the IAEA’s ability to maintain a rapid detection capability regarding Iranian nuclear facilities.”
The Fordo site has been closely watched since Iran began producing 60% enriched uranium there in November 2022, in addition to the Natanz site.
A threshold much higher than the 3.67% set by the 2015 agreement between Tehran and the great powers, and close to the 90% necessary to create an atomic bomb.