Analysis: Nuke deal won't prevent Iran secret work

As world powers and Iran moved closer to an agreement on Iran's disputed nuclear program, the deal under discussion lacks guarantees that Iran won't secretly try to develop nuclear weapons.

That is the conclusion of both supporters and opponents of an agreement, based on Iran's refusal to give inspectors unfettered access to every suspected nuclear site.

It is an argument made by vocal critics, such as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who says Iran can't be trusted to pursue only a peaceful nuclear program.

Supporters of an agreement acknowledge that its tough monitoring requirements may prove less than airtight to prevent cheating, but they argue that a deal is better than no agreement with no inspections.

"No verification system is going to give you 100% confidence there is no cheating," said Robert Einhorn, a former State Department adviser for non-proliferation and arms control in the Obama administration.

Iran has refused to discuss past weapons work, leaving the world in the dark about where it may have conducted secret research and whether it has hidden processing equipment or nuclear fuel, said Olli Heinonen, former deputy director of the United Nations nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency.

"We don't know at this point of time whether all the uranium which is in Iran is really subject to (the agreement), and the same thing with the enrichment program," Heinonen said while monitoring the talks in Lausanne, Switzerland. "What Iran needs to do at this point is come forward with a comprehensive statement about its past program."

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said negotiations could continue beyond Tuesday's deadline if "the talks continue to be productive." Negotiators are working to produce a text with few specifics to be released with documents describing where further work is needed, Earnest said.

The United States, Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany, known as the P5+1, seek a completed agreement by June 30. Iran wants international sanctions that have crippled its economy lifted, and the world powers want limits that would ensure Iran's nuclear program is solely for peaceful purposes, as it claims.

The talks, which began 18 months ago, were supposed to proceed in tandem with an IAEA investigation that would resolve the international community's questions about "possible military dimensions" of Iran's past nuclear research, the Obama administration assured Congress.

Yukiya Amano, director-general of the IAEA, said last week that most of those questions have yet to be answered. The IAEA cannot conclude that all nuclear material in Iran has a peaceful purpose, Amano said. Iran provided some explanations about suspected nuclear detonators but did not explain its studies on topics associated with nuclear blasts, he said.

The IAEA also did not receive explanations for alleged designs of a missile payload that would fit a potential nuclear weapon, Heinonen said.

IAEA inspectors are ensuring that Iran adheres to an interim deal signed in November 2013 until a final deal is reached. They would probably take part in a much more stringent monitoring program as part of any agreement.

That additional monitoring, using remote devices, physical inspections and strict accounting requirements for Iran's nuclear equipment and materials, would "ensure Iran is not developing nuclear weapons and doesn't do so in the future," said Kelsey Davenport, director for non-proliferation policy at the Arms Control Association.

Davenport, who favors an agreement, said it is unrealistic to expect Iran to confess to past nuclear weapons work, given its claims that it is developing nuclear power solely for peaceful purposes.

Iranian officials have ruled out snap inspections and visits to military sites, where covert activity can be hidden, but mechanisms that will be be part of any agreement will give the IAEA much broader access to Iran's declared nuclear sites and facilities and will give the agency access to some sites where it suspects nuclear activity occurred, Davenport said.

Together with monitoring by national spy agencies, those inspections will provide "a much higher degree of confidence" that Iran is not cheating, she said.

That is no guarantee Iran won't find a way to keep a weapons program secret, Davenport conceded, but it is better than the alternative: "Talks fall apart, no deal is reached, which leads back down the path of escalation, far less monitoring, fewer inspections and an unlimited Iranian nuclear program that's much more of a risk than reaching this deal."