VIENNA — Iran has been blocking international nuclear inspectors from investigating possible secret nuclear activities at two sites, the International Atomic Energy Agency said on Tuesday.

The IAEA report, which was seen by dpa, added to the list of unresolved questions about the Islamic Republic’s nuclear past.

A separate report by the Vienna-based agency said Iran boosted its enriched uranium stock far above the limit set by the 2015 nuclear deal with major powers. The agreement aimed to ease concerns about possible nuclear weapons projects by curbing Tehran’s nuclear program.

The IAEA said it has questions about three undeclared sites where nuclear materials were possibly used or stored, and that it told Tehran that it would visit two of them in January.

According to the nuclear agency report, Iran told the IAEA in a letter that it “does not consider itself obliged to respond to such allegations.”

IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi “calls on Iran immediately to cooperate fully with the agency, including by providing prompt access to the locations,” the report said.

“The question is: Where is the nuclear material now?” said a senior diplomat, who is familiar with the IAEA’s Iran file and requested anonymity. The activities in question date back to the 2000s, he added.

The three locations have not appeared in previous IAEA reports and are distinct from a fourth site near Tehran where the IAEA said it found uranium particles.

The IAEA is currently trying to corroborate Tehran’s explanations about this fourth site.

French President Emmanuel Macron met Grossi at the Elysee Palace in Paris later on Tuesday and offered the agency his support.

Macron wants “the strict respect” by Iran of its commitments under the 2015 deal, to which France is a signatory, and called on Tehran to “cooperate immediately and fully with the Agency,” the Elysee said.

The nuclear agency also reported that Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium has reached 1,021 kilograms, five times the amount allowed by the pact.

Although the psychological threshold of 1 ton has been crossed, this amount is still only one-tenth of the stock that Tehran possessed before the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action deal went into effect.

The agreement sought to curb Tehran’s uranium enrichment, because this process can be used to purify material for use in nuclear weapons.

Last year, after the United States pulled out of the nuclear deal and revived crippling economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic, Iran began violating several provisions of the agreement.

In January, Iran announced that its nuclear program would no longer be bound by any restrictions.

In response, Britain, France and Germany triggered the dispute settlement procedures foreseen under the 2015 pact, which could ultimately lead to the revival of U.N. Security Council sanctions against Iran.

However, the three European countries have stressed that they are trying to salvage the deal together with Russia and China — the five countries that are left to uphold the agreement following Washington’s exit.

U.S. President Donald Trump has argued that the deal was too weak to stop Iran from building nuclear weapons in the future, and that it did not curb the country’s regional ambitions.

———

©2020 Deutsche Presse-Agentur GmbH (Hamburg, Germany)

Visit Deutsche Presse-Agentur GmbH (Hamburg, Germany) at www.dpa.de/English.82.0.html

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

—————

PHOTO (for help with images, contact 312-222-4194): Rafael Grossi