National Security

Iran Is Terrified Trump Will Release Secret Nuclear Side Deals

(REUTERS/www.khamenei.ir/Handout)

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Russ Read Pentagon/Foreign Policy Reporter
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A senior Iranian lawmaker is worried that President Donald Trump may leak secret documents related to Iran’s nuclear program.

Alaeddin Boroujerdi, the head of Iran’s parliamentary Commission on Foreign Policy and National Security, claimed that any attempt by Trump to publish documents relating to Iran’s nuclear program from the International Atomic Energy Agency would represent a violation.

“If Trump wants to publish confidential documents exchanged between Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency, it will in fact constitute a violation of the agency’s obligations, because the agency has been committed not to make Iran’s confidential nuclear information and documents available to any country, including the US,” said Boroujerdi, as reported by Iran’s Fars News Monday.

The lawmaker claimed that the IAEA, the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog agency, promised not to allow any information about the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action to be leaked. The Trump transition team was considering publishing some of the secret side deals associated as part of the original agreement after Trump’s inauguration, The Daily Beast reported in December.

Iran’s fears may be justified, according to some experts, as the information contained in the secret side deals could cast further doubt on JCPOA itself.

“The Iranians may fear that secret agreements struck between Iran and the IAEA with regard to constraints on inspections or limits to their scope could be released,” Michael Rubin, a former Pentagon official and resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “The Iranians may also fear that some of their sensitive military information provided to the IAEA could leak.”

One of the side deals reportedly involved Iran’s mysterious Parchin military complex, which was suspected of conducting nuclear weapons activity in 2004.

“The details of that deal showed unprecedented concessions by the U.S. to Iran which basically allowed Iran to be its own inspector at the Parchin facility,” Saeed Ghasseminejad, a fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, told TheDCNF. “Other secret side deals may be related to the sunset clause and may prove that Iran’s ability to acquire a nuclear bomb after a few years is even more than what we know right know.”

 Ghasseminejad added that some of the revelations could be potentially damaging to the legacy of the former Obama administration. He noted that a recently leaked report from Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarif to the Iranian parliament portrayed the former secretary of State as a very accommodating negotiator. Further, similar releases could cause public outrage the regime would prefer to avoid.

Trump’s release of any secret side deals would fall within the mandate of the so-called Corker-Cardin compromise, explained Rubin, which requires that congress be informed of such agreements. He added that should Trump release the side deals, the administration would be “simply righting a wrong perpetrated by Obama and Kerry’s refusal to respect U.S. law.”

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