Syria Places 73 Tonnes of Natural Uranium Under IAEA Safeguards
VIENNA, AUSTRIA — WEB DESK: Syria has placed approximately 73 tonnes of natural uranium under the safeguards and supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency, marking a significant step in resolving a nuclear dispute that stretched back more than 15 years.
Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani announced the move while addressing the IAEA General Conference by video, saying Damascus had brought the nuclear material under the UN watchdog’s safeguards.
The development follows a unanimous decision by the IAEA’s 35-member Board of Governors on September 9 to close Syria’s longstanding nuclear non-compliance file. Reuters reported that the decision recognised increased transparency and cooperation from Syria’s new authorities following the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s government.
The IAEA found approximately 73 metric tonnes of natural uranium metal, mostly in the form of fuel rods, which is now under agency oversight.
Syria’s nuclear dispute centred largely on a facility at Deir al-Zor that was destroyed by an Israeli air strike in 2007.
Earlier this month, the IAEA concluded that the facility had been a clandestine nuclear reactor that should have been declared to the agency under Syria’s safeguards obligations. IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi said the reactor was of a type capable of quickly producing fissile material that could potentially be used for nuclear weapons if the facility had been completed and operated.
That finding is important context: the 73 tonnes now under safeguards should not be described as 73 tonnes of weapons-grade uranium. It is reported as natural uranium metal. Natural uranium and highly enriched, weapons-grade uranium are materially different, and conflating the two would substantially exaggerate the story.
Under the Assad government, Syria had denied that the Deir al-Zor installation was a nuclear reactor. In 2011, the IAEA Board found Syria in non-compliance with its safeguards agreement and referred the matter to the UN Security Council.
Cooperation accelerated after Syria’s political transition. Al-Shaibani said Damascus formally disclosed nuclear material at an undeclared location in a letter to the IAEA on July 17, before signing a cooperation roadmap with the agency on July 29.
He said Grossi subsequently visited the facility on August 16, and Syrian and IAEA specialists began removing reactor remnants from beneath reinforced concrete at the site. Damascus also supplied design information and nuclear-material inventory reports previously requested by the agency.
The IAEA’s decision to close the historic non-compliance file does not mean international nuclear monitoring of Syria has ended. Syria has had an NPT safeguards agreement with the IAEA in force since May 1992, and the newly declared nuclear material remains subject to agency oversight.
The latest developments instead mark a transition from investigating unresolved Assad-era nuclear activities toward monitoring Syria’s declared nuclear material under the international safeguards system.
