Iran Sways between Optimism, Pessimism with IAEA

An IAEA inspector during the installation of surveillance cameras at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility in central Iran, August 2005 (AP - ISNA)
An IAEA inspector during the installation of surveillance cameras at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility in central Iran, August 2005 (AP - ISNA)
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Iran Sways between Optimism, Pessimism with IAEA

An IAEA inspector during the installation of surveillance cameras at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility in central Iran, August 2005 (AP - ISNA)
An IAEA inspector during the installation of surveillance cameras at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility in central Iran, August 2005 (AP - ISNA)

In the grey area between optimism and pessimism, Behrouz Kamalvandi, spokesman of Iran’s atomic agency, said Tehran and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) must find political and technical solutions to outstanding issues.

Iran has agreed with the IAEA regarding three locations where traces of uranium were found, Kamalvandi told reporters on Tuesday.

“If there will be further questions, we will answer and talk to each other to determine how these issues can be followed up,” added Kamalvandi.

The IAEA has long demanded that Iran explain the reasons behind inspectors finding traces of uranium in the cities of Varamin and Turquzabad in southern Tehran and the city of Abadeh in Fars province.

Kamalvandi said that discussions underway with the IAEA revolve around the agency finding traces of U-236 in the three sites.

According to the Iranian spokesman, the traces belong to material transported by a Russian company working in Iran.

Earlier this month, the IAEA said Iran had given widespread assurances to finally cooperate in the long-stalled investigation of undeclared sites.

Upon his return from Tehran, IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi told reporters that he had received promises from Iranian officials that Tehran would cooperate by giving the agency information and access to undeclared sites.

This would have indicated a significant improvement after Iranian stalling for years, but Tehran later denied having approved site access or allowing inspectors to talk to concerned officials.

“The issue of letting people in never came up during Grossi’s two-day visit to Iran,” said Kamalvandi, adding that there was no agreement regarding installing new cameras at Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Last Friday, Grossi announced that talks that had been agreed upon with Iranian officials could begin early this week. He said the exchanges could extend to between a week and ten days.

“This path is a step forward, but the future is grey. I am neither optimistic or pessimistic,” Kamalvandi told state-owned ISNA then.

Kamalvandi added that such issues must be resolved in their political and technical dimensions.

Before the recent agreement with Grossi, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian called on the IAEA to solve outstanding issues “from a technical, non-political perspective.” Iranian officials repeated this request during Grossi’s visit.

Discussions about reviving the Iran nuclear deal stopped in March 2022, and the latest attempt at mediation by the EU to return to the agreement failed last September.



Trump Victory Expected to Boost Musk's Mars Dream

US President Donald Trump and Elon Musk are seen at the Firing Room Four after the launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon spacecraft on NASA's SpaceX Demo-2 mission to the International Space Station from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, US, May 30, 2020. (Reuters)
US President Donald Trump and Elon Musk are seen at the Firing Room Four after the launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon spacecraft on NASA's SpaceX Demo-2 mission to the International Space Station from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, US, May 30, 2020. (Reuters)
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Trump Victory Expected to Boost Musk's Mars Dream

US President Donald Trump and Elon Musk are seen at the Firing Room Four after the launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon spacecraft on NASA's SpaceX Demo-2 mission to the International Space Station from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, US, May 30, 2020. (Reuters)
US President Donald Trump and Elon Musk are seen at the Firing Room Four after the launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon spacecraft on NASA's SpaceX Demo-2 mission to the International Space Station from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, US, May 30, 2020. (Reuters)

Elon Musk's dream of transporting humans to Mars will become a bigger national priority under the administration of US President-elect Donald Trump, sources said, signaling big changes for NASA's moon program and a boost for Musk's SpaceX.

NASA's Artemis program, which aims to use SpaceX's Starship rocket to put humans on the moon as a proving ground for later Mars missions, is expected to focus more on the Red Planet under Trump and target uncrewed missions there this decade, according to four people familiar with Trump's burgeoning space policy agenda, according to Reuters.

Targeting Mars with spacecraft built for astronauts is not only more ambitious than focusing on the moon, but is also fraught with risk and potentially more expensive. Musk, who danced onstage at a Trump rally wearing an "Occupy Mars" T-shirt in October, spent $119 million on Trump's White House bid and has successfully elevated space policy at an unusual time in a presidential transition. In September, weeks after Musk endorsed Trump, the latter told reporters that the moon was a "launching pad" for his ultimate goal to reach Mars.

"At a minimum, we're going to get a more realistic Mars plan, you'll see Mars being set as an objective," said Doug Loverro, a space industry consultant who once led NASA's human exploration unit under Trump, who served as U.S. president from 2017 to 2021.

SpaceX, Musk and the Trump campaign did not immediately return requests for comment. A NASA spokeswoman said it "wouldn’t be appropriate to speculate on any changes with the new administration." Plans could still change, the sources added, as the Trump transition team takes shape in the coming weeks. Trump launched the Artemis program in 2019 during his first term and it was one of the few initiatives maintained under the administration of President Joe Biden. Trump space advisers want to revamp a program they will argue has languished in their absence, the sources said. Musk, who also owns electric-vehicle maker Tesla and brain-chip startup Neuralink, has made slashing government regulation and trimming down bureaucracy another core basis of his Trump support.

For space, the sources said, Musk's deregulation desires are likely to trigger changes at the Federal Aviation Administration's commercial space office, whose oversight of private rocket launches has frustrated Musk for slowing down SpaceX's Starship development.

The FAA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

NASA under Trump, the sources said, is likely to favor fixed-price space contracts that shift greater responsibility onto private companies and scale back over-budget programs that have strained the Artemis budget.

That could spell trouble for the only rocket NASA owns, the Space Launch System rocket (SLS), whose roughly $24 billion development since 2011 has been led by Boeing and Northrop Grumman. Cancelling the program, some say, would be difficult since it would cost thousands of jobs and leave the U.S. even more dependent on SpaceX.

Boeing and Northrop did not immediately return a request for comment.

Musk, whose predictions have sometimes proven overly ambitious, said in September that SpaceX will land Starship on Mars in 2026 and a crewed mission will follow in four years' time. Trump has said at campaign rallies that he has discussed these ideas with Musk.

Many industry experts see this timeline as improbable.

"Is it possible for Elon to put a Starship on the surface of Mars in a one-way mission by the end of Trump's term? Absolutely, he certainly could do that," said Scott Pace, the top space policy official during Trump's first term.

"Is that a manned mission on Mars? No," Pace added. "You have to walk before you run."