Iran’s Strategic Measures for the Removal of Sanctions: Highlights

The Iranian Parliament has recently passed a bill called the “Strategic Measures for the Removal of Sanctions”. The bill aims to boost the nuclear activity of Iran in the wake of killing of the Iranian nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh. He was the head of the Iranian defence ministry innovation centre. He was assassinated on November 27, 2020 during a Gunman attack in the town of Absard in Tehran region.

Key features of strategic measures for the removal of sanctions bill

• The bill aims to increase uranium enrichment level to 20% or more. Currently Iran is enriching its uranium at more than 4%. The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action has capped the enrichment level of Uranium at 3.67%.
• The bill will restore the Arak nuclear reactor. The reactor was set to be redesigned for the production of radioisotopes. By this the reactor will not produce weapon grade plutonium under the Joint Comprehensive Plan Of Action.
• The bill abandons voluntary compliance with the additional protocol to the safeguard agreement under International atomic energy agency.

What is nuclear enrichment process?

It is a process to create an effective nuclear fuel. For instance, uranium occurs as uranium-235 and uranium-238. They are the two isotopes of Uranium. Isotopes are atoms with same mass number and different atomic number. Of these two forms, only uranium 235 undergoes fission with thermal neutrons. In other words, only Uranium 235 is ideal for nuclear energy. Higher the concentration of Uranium 235, higher is the nuclear energy produced. This process of enriching the fissile material in a nuclear fuel is called nuclear enrichment.

The naturally occurring uranium does not have high concentration of Uranium 235. The concentration of Uranium 235 in the naturally occurring Uranium is only 0.72% and the rest is Uranium 238. Therefore, the uranium 235 is artificially added to increase the nuclear energy received from the fuel.

Mohsen Fakhrizadeh

He was an academic physicist. He led the green salt project and the organisation of defensive Innovation and Research. In 2006, the United Nations Security Council imposed an asset freeze to Mohsen as Iran refused to make him available for the interview of International Atomic Energy Agency.

Green salt project

It is an alleged secret project of Iran that focuses on high explosives, random processing and missile Warhead design. The project derives its name from Uranium tetrafluoride. This is because Uranium tetrachloride is also known as green salt.

Green salt

It is a green crystalline solid compound and is slightly soluble in water. It occurs in Uranous state. The tetravalent state of Uranium is called Uranous state.

Month: Current Affairs - November, 2020