Iran: Nuclear Deal

Lord Dodds of Duncairn Excerpts

Wednesday 15th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

My right hon. Friend makes a good point. The International Atomic Energy Agency, which has responsibility for this, has agreed with Iran a road map and set of activities that need to be carried out so that it can publish its final report. We do not know how long that will take—probably six months or so—but there is conditionality here: until that report is published, the sanctions will not be lifted. That is part of the process that needs to be completed. The IAEA will have the ability to gain technical access, where it needs to do so, and to have technical discussions with Iranian experts, and it is confident—this is completely independent of the negotiators in Vienna—that the measures put in place, which Iran has agreed to as part of the deal, are adequate to allow it to do its job, complete its mission and issue that report.

[Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)]

The Foreign Secretary talked about inspections and the 20 or more days for access to be gained to sites of concern. How confident is he that the citizens of this country can be assured that, in that period of arbitration and discussion about access, Iran will not be able to cover up illicit activity?

[Mr Hammond]

These negotiations have gone on for a very long time, and on each and every one of these issues, we have had very lengthy, detailed and technical discussions, and this is one of the issues I have been particularly focused on. I have sought detailed reassurance from our US allies that their assets and resources allow them to be confident of maintaining eyes on the situation from the time access is demanded to the time it is granted. After many hours of discussion, I have been satisfied that it will be possible for us to retain a high degree of confidence that a site has not been tampered with, or, if it has, for us to know exactly how it has been tampered with during that interval. Of course, removing radioactive material from a site is not easy; the radioactive footprint will be present, unless very extensive remediation and cleaning works have taken place.