The preamble of the Joint Plan of Action (JPA) announced in November 2013 by Iran and the P5+1 states that the goal of the negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program “is to reach a mutually-agreed long-term comprehensive solution that would ensure Iran’s nuclear programme will be exclusively peaceful.” This comprehensive solution “would involve a mutually defined enrichment programme with practical limits and transparency measures to ensure the peaceful nature of the programme.” The JPA also states that “Iran reaffirms that under no circumstances will Iran ever seek or develop any nuclear weapons.”

As part of the JPA, which is not legally binding, both sides had committed to take various “first steps,” with a “duration of 6 months, and renewable by mutual consent.” The JPA was subsequently renewed by mutual consent on July 18, 2014 for an additional four months and is now set to expire on November 24, 2014. Iran’s listed steps include limiting uranium enrichment, refraining from reprocessing, and facilitating enhanced monitoring. The JPA also states that “the final step of a comprehensive solution, which the parties aim to conclude negotiating and commence implementing no more than one year after the adoption of this document, would include ratification and implementation of the Additional Protocol, consistent with the respective roles of the President and the Majlis (Iranian parliament).”

These negotiations now create a question for the U.S. policy community: What monitoring and verification measures and tools will the U.S., its allies, and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) require, in relation to a comprehensive nuclear agreement with Iran, in order to “ensure Iran’s nuclear programme will be exclusively peaceful?” In light of Iran’s previous history of noncompliance with its nuclear agreements, including noncooperation with the IAEA, there is reason for concern that Iran may push the envelope on the letter of the agreement, fail to cooperate with inspectors, or undertake illicit activities in covert facilities. The goal of this report is to address such concerns by mapping out a sufficiently rigorous monitoring architecture to “ensure Iran’s nuclear programme will be exclusively peaceful.”

In relationship to a nuclear agreement with Iran, the goal of monitoring is often described as the ability to detect in a timely manner a “break out” dash by Iran at its declared facilities to produce enough weapons-grade uranium or separated plutonium for a nuclear weapon. In comparison with a break out scenario, in which Iran were to produce weapons grade uranium at overt facilities, it may be more likely that Tehran would engage in a “sneak-out” scenario, in which “Iran could seek to build covert enrichment facilities in order to build nuclear weapons in secret.”

The 2007 National Intelligence Estimate assessed with “moderate confidence that Iran probably would use covert facilities – rather than its declared nuclear sites – for the production of highly enriched uranium for a weapon.”

If a monitoring architecture – including both the negotiated measures and national intelligence means – is to “ensure the peaceful nature” of Iran’s nuclear program, it must in a timely manner detect both “break outs” and “sneak outs.”

The Task Force has determined that to evaluate the logic and efficacy of any nuclear deal, it is essential to assess the amount of risk that would be assumed by the parties. We have agreed that nine elements are critical to assessing and mitigating the spectrum of risk -- six of these are potential elements of an effective agreement; the other three recommendations are U.S. government implementation steps that would facilitate effective verification of the agreement.

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See full text at the Federation of American Scientists: Verification Requirements for a Nuclear Agreement with Iran