Iran 'Not Entirely Transparent', UN Nuclear Chief Says

“Nowhere is safe for those powers who seek to threaten our security,” IRGC commander Hossein Salami said in a thinly veiled threat to the United States and its allies, suggesting that Iran’s “ocean-liners” can get within range of any target.

Tasnim news released videos showing the launch of a missile from the deck of a vessel, however the type of the missile has not yet been verified. If true that a long-range ballistic missile was fired from a vessel, it would mark a significant moment, since Iran has always maintained that its military posture is purely defensive. But boasting about warships appearing “at any spot in the oceans” with long-range missiles is not.

So far, no images of a test has been revealed, and Iranian government media on Tuesday did not follow up on the claim, but Salami's statements shows the IRGC is pursuing some project the use ships as a launching pad for long-range missiles.

In the last few years, Iran has moved from a largely subdued, albeit disgruntled, regional power to one constantly flexing its muscles and daring confrontation –probably because it knows it will not get one.

At every turn in his term, President Joe Biden has made it clear that he’s not looking for conflict with Iran, specially since the October 7th Hamas attack on Israel. Around 170 attacks by Iran's proxies on US forces has not altered that US policy –not even after a drone strike in Jordan last month that killed three American soldiers and wounded many more.

President Biden did react to the loss, of course, authorizing a “multi-layered” strike on targets related to Iran’s IRGC in Iraq and Syria. But his critics were not satisfied. He had waited “too long”, they said, “telegraphing” the military’s intentions, which helped the IRGC move out of the way and avoid a costly embarrassment.

It is this cautious approach, Biden critics say, that has emboldened Iran to a dangerous degree.

Far more worrying than an unverified missile launch, however, and far more telling in terms of Iran’s growing belligerence, is Iran’s nuclear program.

On Monday, not long before Salami claimed a new missile test, Iran’s former head of Atomic Energy Organizations signaled that his country was closer than ever to a nuclear weapon. 

In a televised interview, Ali-Akbar Salehi was asked about Iran’s capability to develop a nuclear warhead. He refused a direct answer but said, “think about what a car needs; it needs a chassis, an engine, a steering wheel, a gearbox. You ask if we've made the gearbox, I say yes. Have we made the engine? Yes, but each one serves its own purpose".

"We have [crossed] all the thresholds of nuclear science and technology,” he summed up.

Iranian officials have always insisted that the country’s nuclear program is peaceful, but experts including the head of the UN nuclear watchdog say enriching uranium to such levels as Iran has done (60%) cannot be justified or even explained by peaceful intentions.

Once more, Biden critics point at him and his administration.

“Iran is within weeks of testing nuclear weapons and the Biden Administration has helped make an additional $100 billion available to them since Biden took office to help fund the project,” said former White House official and Director of Allison Center for National Security. “We’re getting to the threshold in which only military force may be required.”

President Biden hoped (and tried from his first day in office) to revive the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran or forge some form of agreement to at least slow Iran’s march towards nuclear weapons. He abandoned Trump's ‘maximum pressure’ campaign against Iran, taking most threats off the table and looking the other way as Iran pocketed billions shipping oil to China. To top it all, the administration released billions in frozen Iranian funds.

But all it has received in return is more belligerence, more missiles and suicide drones –which, ironically, may force Joe Biden to enter a confrontation he’s tried so hard to avoid.

In a televised interview, Salehi, who was also foreign minister (2010-2013), was asked if Iran has achieved the capability of developing a nuclear bomb. Avoiding a direct answer he stated, "We have [crossed] all the thresholds of nuclear science and technology. Here's an example: Imagine what a car needs; it needs a chassis, an engine, a steering wheel, a gearbox. You're asking if we've made the gearbox, I say yes. Have we made the engine? Yes, but each one serves its own purpose," the senior regime insider said.

The likelihood of Iran acquiring nuclear weapons has been a prevalent concern for analysts and officials in the region and in Western countries, but recently the Islamic Republic has become more vocal about its military and nuclear progress. While Tehran insists that its nuclear program is peaceful, the regime has sped up its uranium enrichment to levels that serve no purpose other than building nuclear weapons.

The global community has been aware of Iran’s nuclear advancement, acknowledged in numerous reports by the United Nation’s nuclear watchdog, the IAEA. However, except US sanctions, other countries and the United Nations have taken no effective measures.

This is not the first time that officials of the Islamic Republic have claimed to have the ability to build a nuclear bomb. In July 2022, Kamal Kharrazi, the head of the Strategic Council for Foreign Relations of the Islamic Republic and a close advisor to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, said in an interview with Al Jazeera that Iran had the technical capabilities to build a nuclear bomb but does not intend to do so. 

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"We have increased the level of uranium enrichment from 20 percent to 60 percent in just a few days, and it can easily be enriched to 90 percent," Kharrazi said, implying that Iran is very close to making nuclear weapons.

His statement came as Mohammad Eslami, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, has never dismissed the possibility of enrichment to the level required for bomb-making, reiterating that the decision for 90 percent uranium enrichment depends on higher authorities, meaning Khamenei.

In January, a TV host in Iran suggested on an IRGC-affiliated channel that it is perhaps time to produce nuclear weapons, sparking controversy. The host, Hossein Hosseini, said, "Is it not time for Iran to produce its first nuclear weapon, given the ongoing conflict against Gaza and repeated threats from Israel?" Eslami, in response, said that “the production of weapons of mass destruction has never been part of Iran's defensive doctrine and is not aligned with its foreign policy," despite the country's ongoing enrichment effort.

Islamic Republic officials have repeatedly stated that according to a fatwa (Islamic decree) by the Supreme Leader, the construction of an atomic bomb is not on Tehran's agenda. However, few in the international community believe in a fatwa that can be revoked at any moment.

In an interview with Iran International on February 8, leading nuclear weapons expert David Albright warned that this is the time when “Iran may decide to make nuclear weapons.”

“You have a situation where the security incentives for Iran to build nuclear weapons have increased,” he pointed out. “The transparency of the nuclear program has decreased significantly.. Their nuclear weapons capabilities have grown over the last several years… And it's also a point in time where people's attention is elsewhere. The Iran nuclear issue barely makes the newspapers these days.” In the past two decades, every US president has announced that a “nuclear Iran” will not be tolerated, often stressing that “all options are on the table” to prevent the regime in Tehran acquiring nuclear weapons. And in the meantime, Iran has advanced its nuclear capabilities in every respect.

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But Albright believes a “balancing act” is possible if the US and Israel move swiftly to make the regime understand “it's not in its interest to build nuclear weapons” before it reaches a definite conclusion that it has to have “nuclear deterrent” against the US and Israel.

“We're worried that the US and Israeli intelligence agencies are distracted,” Albright told Iran International, “and Israeli intelligence isn't foolproof, as this attack on October 7th proved in a very dramatic way.

According to Al Jazeera, “a confidential IAEA report released last month indicated that Iran’s estimated stockpile of enriched uranium had reached more than 22 times the limit" set out in the 2015 JCPOA accord between Tehran and world powers.

In June 2022, Iran removed all IAEA surveillance and monitoring equipment, needed to monitor the implementation of the 2015 JCPOA nuclear accord from its nuclear installations and since March it agreed to put them back on operation, but it has been stonewalling the process ever since.

IAEA Director-General Rafael Grossi said in December that inspectors “confirmed…an increased production of highly enriched uranium at both of Iran’s main nuclear facilities.” Speaking to Bloomberg on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos in January, Grossi reiterated his concerns that no technical obstacle remains between Iran and a nuclear bomb, implying that the regime can make them now if it wanted to.

Condemning Iran's advancement, the US said the December 26, 2023 report by the IAEA highlighted that Iran has increased its rate of production of uranium enriched up to 60% at Natanz and Fordow to levels observed between January and June 2023. "These findings represent a backwards step by Iran and will result in Iran tripling its monthly production rate of uranium enriched up to 60%."

Iran's proxies in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen have joined Hamas's war on Israel and US targets in the region since October 7 when Gaza-based Hamas invaded Israel.

"Today, the issue of Palestine has become the world's top issue, and October 7 and the Al-Aqsa Intifada showed that Palestine is alive and will not surrender to the demands of the Zionist regime and the coercive powers, including the United States government," Hossein Amir-Abdollahian stated during the meeting. It is believed that at least 15 members of factions such as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad were in attendance. 

During the regional tour, the Iranian Foreign Minister also met Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus on Sunday and senior Lebanese government officials and leaders of Palestinian groups in Beirut on Saturday.

Iran continues to deny its hand in the atrocities of October 7 in which 1,200 mostly civilians were murdered by Hamas and another 250 or more taken hostage to Gaza. However, Tehran continues its very public, high level engagement with Palestinian militant groups which it has for years funded, armed and trained.

Israel has since intensified its airstrikes on Iranian-backed military targets in Syria and Iranian military personnel since the war broke out, with high-level killings gaining pace. 

The Houthis identified the vessel as the Star Iris. While the group's military spokesman, Yahya Saree, stated that the ship was American, maritime-shipping trackers identified it as a Marshall Islands-flagged vessel, owned by a Greek company.

The British maritime security firm Ambrey disclosed that the vessel, reportedly heading toward Iran, was targeted by two separate missile attacks while navigating the Bab al-Mandab Strait. The vessel sustained damage to its starboard side as a result of the attacks, as confirmed by Ambrey.

Since mid-November, the Houthi militants have been launching drones and missiles at commercial ships, claiming retaliation against Israel's military actions in Gaza. While they claim to be attacking either Israeli or US-affiliated vessels, the attacks have impacted international vessels and disrupted global shipping operations. Several companies have been forced to reroute their vessels away from the Red Sea, opting for longer and costlier routes around Africa.

Ambrey stated that the bulker was en route to Bandar Imam Khomeini, Iran. "The group owner and operator regularly trades bulk cargo with Iran, so this was assessed to be the likely destination," the firm added.

Highlighting a potential motive for the attack, Ambrey noted that the group owner of the bulker is listed on the US stock market index NASDAQ. The US has come under fire since the war in Gaza after offering full support for Israel's right to defend itself for the October 7 invasion of Iran-backed Hamas, which sparked the bloodiest war since Gaza came under control of the Palestinian militia.

The announcement claimed that on Saturday, US forces "successfully conducted self-defense strikes against two unmanned surface vessels (USV) and three mobile anti-ship cruise missiles (ASCM) north of Al Hudaydah, Yemen, that were prepared to launch against ships in the Red Sea".

CENTCOM clarified that the vessels and missiles were identified in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen and posed an imminent threat to US Navy ships and merchant vessels in the region. The operation was conducted with the aim of safeguarding freedom of navigation and ensuring the safety and security of international waters for both US Navy and merchant vessels.

Yemen’s Houthi militants have caused huge trade by targeting shipping lanes in key maritime areas such as the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden, and the Bab el-Mandeb Strait in support of Hamas's war against Israel. 

Iran-backed Hamas invaded Israel on October 7 and the Jewish state's retaliatory attacks have seen large swathes of Gaza destroyed. The Houthis' actions aim to force a ceasefire on Israel.

The Houthis claim to target exclusively Israeli and Israel-bound ships, citing a campaign initiated following a call by Iran's Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, in early November, but global shipping has suffered and international vessels have been victim to attacks.

Saturday's defensive attacks are the lastest in a series of actions from the US as the Biden administration comes under increasing pressure to take action against Iran's proxies which have launched over 180 attacks on US targets in the Middle East since October 7, including a deadly attack killing troops in Jordan.

The Biden administration listed the group as specially designated global terrorists (SDGT) last month in response to their rising threats in the region. However, when the administration assumed office in early 2021, it delisted the Iran-backed Houthi designation as both a foreign terrorist organization and as a specially designated global terrorist.