Chair,

I have the honour to speak on behalf of the European Union. The following countries align themselves with this statement: Türkiye, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Ukraine, the Republic of Moldova and San Marino.

The European Union would like to thank the Director General for his report contained in document GOV/2022/26 and Deputy Director General Aparo for the technical briefing on 1 June 2022.

The EU welcomes the Director General's update on the implementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement and the implementation status of the Additional Protocol in Iran. We commend the Director General and the Secretariat for their professional, objective, independent and impartial work in verifying Iran's safeguards obligations. The EU encourages the IAEA to continue to evaluate all safeguards-relevant information available to it in line with standard practice.

For the past years, the EU has expressed its concerns at the presence of uranium particles of anthropogenic origin at three undeclared locations in Iran, namely Turquzabad, Varamin and Marivan, and at the undeclared previous nuclear activities and use of nuclear material at Lavisan-Shian. At the same time, the EU has been calling on Iran to provide IAEA with the necessary explanations in accordance with obligations under its Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement. Despite numerous opportunities to clarify the outstanding safeguards matters, and repeated and strong calls by the Board of Governors on Iran, including a resolution in June 2020,the progress to date has clearly been insufficient.

The Director General’s current report, which completes the actions set out in the Joint Statement of 5 March 2022, adds to the already existing concerns. The DG’s concludes that:

Iran has not provided technically credible explanations in relation to the Agency’s findings at the undeclared locations Turquzabad, Varamin, Marivan;
Iran has not informed of the present location of the nuclear material and/or of the equipment contaminated with nuclear material that was moved from Turquzabad in 2018;
nuclear activities and nuclear material used at Lavisan-Shian in 2003, involving at least one uranium metal disc, were not declared by Iran to the Agency as required under Iran’s Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement.

We also note with serious concern that the DG’s report points to another, unknown, location as the possible origin of isotopically altered particles found at Turquzabad.

The above are clear indications that undeclared nuclear material and/or equipment contaminated by nuclear material has been present and may still exist in Iran today.

The EU is gravely concerned that the Agency could not confirm the correctness and completeness of Iran’s declarations under its Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement, and that, consequently, these issues remain outstanding.

We urge Iran to co-operate immediately and in full with the IAEA in order for the Agency to be in a position to provide the required assurances that Iran’s nuclear programme is exclusively peaceful.

The EU reiterates its full support to and trust in the IAEA for the fulfilment of its mandate under the NPT Safeguards Agreements. The EU strongly supports DG Grossi’s tireless efforts to pursue constructive engagement with Iran in order to address all issues that need to be urgently resolved.

The EU Member States therefore strongly support the resolution proposed   by France, Germany, the UK and the USA and call on other Board members to support it.

The EU takes note of the report and appreciates that the Director General continues to report to the Board of Governors, as appropriate, and requests that this report be made public.

Thank you, Chair.