Examination of Witnesses (Questions 54
- 59)
WEDNESDAY 23 MAY 2007
DR ALI
ANSARI AND
DR FRANK
BARNABY
Chairman: Dr. Ansari and Dr. Barnaby,
thank you very much indeed for joining us today. As you know,
as part of our inquiry into global security, we are concentrating
on the whole Iranian dimension. We are concerned, inevitably,
with nuclear issues, and we look forward to tackling your expertise.
Q54 Ms Stuart: I wish to pull
two questions together. These days there is a healthy suspicion
about the use of intelligence and, more to the point, its reliability.
What is your assessment of Iran's capability? How much time do
we have before Iran will be capable of developing aggressive nuclear
weapons and delivering them? My second question is how do you
assess the difficulty of allowing a country such as Iran to proceed
with the civil use of nuclear energy, at the same time as wishing
to prevent the military and aggressive use of nuclear weapons?
Dr. Barnaby: We do not know exactly
what the Iranians have and at what stage they are in their programme.
It is speculation. What we know mainly comes from the International
Atomic Energy Agency's inspections, which happen fairly regularly,
but it does not see everything.
What we say about the Iranian nuclear capability
is speculative. I must emphasise that. It seems as though the
Iranians are operating an uranium mine at Saghand. They mine and
mill uranium, and they also have an uranium conversion facility
that is able to convert the yellowcake—uranium oxide U308—into
uranium hexafluoride, which is a gas that can be used in gas centrifuges
to enrich uranium. By enrichment, we mean increasing the percentage
of uranium 235 in uranium.
Natural uranium contains 0.7% uranium 235—seven
atoms per thousand—whereas using it as nuclear fuel, which
is what the Iranians say they want to do, involves increasing
that from 0.7% to about 3.5%, which they do in a gas centrifuge
plant. We know that they are operating two of those at a place
called Natanz: one is a pilot plant, the other is a plant that
could be used for industrial-scale enrichment to produce a fairly
large amount of nuclear fuel for nuclear power reactors. The Russians
have just completed a 1,200 MW electricity nuclear power reactor
at Bushehr, but the Iranians hope to have several more at Bushehr—the
bid is out for two more, for example—and they hope to produce
uranium dioxide fuel, which is 3.5% enriched, for those reactors
indigenously to fuel the power reactors that they will eventually
operate.
The suspicions that you have mentioned arise
because, if the uranium is enriched not to 3.5% but to 93%, it
could be used to make nuclear weapons. The energy required to
enrich from the natural 0.7% to 3.5% is some 80% of the energy
required to make weapons-grade material. So, if you can make nuclear
fuel, that is a big step towards making weapons-grade material.
This is the point that people are concerned about. The Iranians
operate the mines, mill the uranium and convert the uranium to
uranium hexafluoride for use in gas centrifuges.
The Iranians also operate four small research
reactors, three of which were supplied by China and one by the
US. They have been doing that for many years. The first of those
reactors came into operation in 1967, which is a very long time
ago, during the time of the Shah. That long experience in operating
research reactors has given Iran a cadre of nuclear scientists
and engineers who could be diverted to producing nuclear weapons
and who would be able to do that.
The second thing that I should like to emphasise
is that the technologies required for civil nuclear power are
identical to the technologies required for military purposes.
The only way in which we can detect whether Iran is going for
nuclear weapons would be if we had evidence that they were producing
highly enriched—up to 93%—uranium. That would be the
indicator.
Q55 Chairman: Dr. Barnaby, I am conscious
that this is a huge subject and we could be here for a very long
time. I apologise, but we have quite a large number of questions
that we want to put to you. I am afraid that I shall have to ask
you to close this one, so I can move on to further questions.
I am sorry about the time constraint.
Dr. Barnaby: The Iranians are
now building. One of the reactors is very old, as I have said,
and they want to replace it with a new research reactor at Arak.
That would be a heavy water reactor, which is ideal for producing
plutonium for nuclear weapons. That is the alternative to using
highly enriched uranium. The heavy water reactor at Arak is also
a cause for concern. Does that answer your first question?
Q56 Ms Stuart: It think it answers
both, because you are saying that we do not really know. The nuclear
and civil technology is so similar that it is a question of gradation.
Dr. Barnaby: Yes, it is.
Q57 Ms Stuart: I also understood
that the energy required to get to the civil level is 80% of the
energy required—it is just another 20% to get to the next
level—so it is not much of a jump.
Dr. Barnaby: It is a very large
percentage, although I cannot remember exactly what it is.
Chairman: Thank you very much. We now
come to the key question of how domestic politics in Iran is interfacing
with this apparent drive in the nuclear direction.
Q58 Mr. Hamilton: Gentlemen, as we
know, Iran's political structure is very complex, and there are
a number of different centres of power. Are we sure that the Iranians
intend to produce nuclear weapons, or a nuclear warhead, or a
bomb of any sort? I ask that because, when we were in Washington
recently, Iran's ambassador to the United Nations made it quite
clear that it was completely un-Islamic to produce a nuclear weapon
and that they were simply pursuing civil nuclear power. Are we
sure that nuclear weapons is what they want, and if we are sure,
do we know which of the centres of power are behind this move
to produce nuclear weapons and whether all Iran's politicians
are behind it?
Dr. Ansari: As many of us are
aware, the nuclear programme and its development in Iran is a
highly sensitive and very nationalistic issue. I think that, in
some ways, it has been exploited very effectively by the Government
of Mr. Ahmadinejad in order, perhaps, to disguise other failings
in his Administration. What that has meant is that there has been
less debate about the nuclear programme than we would have liked,
certainly in the public arena.
I think that there are very few people in Iran—almost
none at all—who would publicly say that they want to go
towards a weaponisation programme. Almost everyone will say that
this is a civil programme, and that civil programme has widespread
support. However, there has been dissent, certainly among the
more pragmatic elements within the regime, as well as open dissent
among some of the reformist politicians, who argued that it was
not in the national interest of the country to go down this route,
because it was harming the country's security.
The difficulty is really in the way in which
we address the issue from our side. For a long time, particularly
from across the Atlantic, there was basically blanket opposition
to any form of nuclear programme in Iran. It must be said that
it is difficult to convince Iranians of any political hue that
they cannot even have a civil nuclear programme. I think that
that argument is effectively lost, and it is not one that we should
spend too much time on.
On the other side, yes, I think that there are
elements that can be engaged with, to use that term, to examine
the different views in Iran. Some in Iran say that they do not
want to go in a direction that would be to the detriment of their
national security. If seeking a self-sufficient nuclear programme
is going to cause difficulty for Iran in the international sphere,
some say that Iran should rethink it. That said, however, one
could say that there is a very broad consensus that the achievement
of a civil nuclear programme, in one form or another, is something
that Iran has a right to. I therefore think that we do not have
much room to explore in that area. In other areas, however, I
think that there is an enormous amount of room to explore—it
is just that that has not been done yet.
Q59 Mr. Hamilton: Can I move on to
ask you another question, because I think that you have dealt
with how Iran's nuclear ambitions are being played out in its
domestic politics? Iran's human rights record has been internationally
condemned. I think that they have the second highest level of
death penalties of any country in the world, after China, and
that stoning to death is still used along with the execution of
children. Do you think that the concentration of the international
community on Iran's nuclear ambitions, whether civil or for weaponisation,
is detracting attention from its human rights record and its violation
of human rights?
Dr. Ansari: In a word, yes. I
think that that is absolutely right. One of the points that irritates
me no end is that the President in Iran champions and defends
Iran's national rights, yet, quite frankly, he ignores the national
vote. He is not prepared to face, even by Iranian standards, a
free and fair election. By Iranian standards, elections may be
moving in the right direction, although I would not necessarily
say that they are free and fair. None the less, even by the standards
of elections that were held in 1997 or 2000 and 2001, the elections
that we have seen subsequently have been pretty poor.
On the one hand, the President can say that
he is a popularly elected President who has the national mandate,
and so on and so forth, when he ignores very basic rights on a
number of different levels; and yet on the other hand, he says,
"Well, I am championing national rights". I think that
that is a point that has not really been made often enough, but
in fact many people in Iran make it—they point out that
there is a certain hypocrisy and inconsistency. However, I think
that we are so obsessed—sometimes for justifiable reasons,
but sometimes I think that the obsession goes a little too far—by
the singular issue of security that we ignore the other aspects
of human security. We should recognise that we have a political
problem in Iran, not a nuclear problem per se. The issue is one
of relations between Iran and the United States and Iran and the
European Union, but it also involves the way in which the political
system operates. We should pay some attention to that angle—we
do not pay nearly enough.
Chairman: Thank you. Mr. Keetch, you
had a supplementary question about what Dr. Barnaby said at the
outset.
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