Iran’s Nuclear Program and International Atomic Energy Agency Safeguards to Prevent Nuclear Proliferation: A Review

Abstract

The world is facing reality of Iranian nuclear proliferation, as the time is passing on and international organizations are failed to convince Iran, the chances of nuclear proliferation exist. However, till date international regulatory bodies International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), and Global Powers (P5+1) have curtailed Iranian nuclear process to some extent. It would not be possible without the intense inspections conducted by the IAEA and repeated efforts to force Iran to abide by IAEA technical measures, pacts and signed supplementary procedures. Iranian nuclear proliferation concerns became the talk of the town in 2002 on disclosure of clandestine nuclear activities at Iranian nuclear reactors and raised serious proliferation concerns for some in the international community. However, strict IAEA inspection mechanism, and multilateral diplomacy prevented Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons for almost two decades. In the 2015, on international pressure Iran signed the nuclear deal to halt its nuclear enrichment activities but in the 2018 the US unilateral withdrawal once again brought this issue into limelight and irked tension and proliferation concerns in the Middle East. During this study, we tried to scrutinize Iranian nuclear proliferation concerns, role of IAEA safeguards and JCPOA an achievement of multilateral diplomacy and its probable failure.