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UN Nuclear Chief in Iran to 'Reach Diplomatic Solutions'

FILE - International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi during a meeting with the Japanese government in Tokyo Thursday, March 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko, Pool, File)
FILE - International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi during a meeting with the Japanese government in Tokyo Thursday, March 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko, Pool, File)
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UN Nuclear Chief in Iran to 'Reach Diplomatic Solutions'

FILE - International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi during a meeting with the Japanese government in Tokyo Thursday, March 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko, Pool, File)
FILE - International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi during a meeting with the Japanese government in Tokyo Thursday, March 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko, Pool, File)

International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Grossi was to hold talks with top Iranian officials Thursday on Tehran's nuclear program, a week after Donald Trump's re-election as US president.
During his first term in the White House from 2017 to 2021, Trump was the architect of a policy called "maximum pressure" which levied against Tehran biting sanctions that had been lifted through a landmark nuclear agreement in 2015.
Grossi, who is the director general of the UN agency, arrived at Tehran airport on Wednesday evening and was greeted by Behrouz Kamalvandi, the spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI).
Grossi is set to meet Thursday in Tehran with AEOI chief Mohammad Eslami as well as Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who was chief negotiator in the nuclear talks between Tehran and the major powers that resulted in the 2015 deal formally called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or JCPOA.
The deal, reached after 21 months of negotiations between Iran and world powers, gave Tehran sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its nuclear program to guarantee that it could not develop a nuclear weapon -- something it has always denied wanting to do.
Three years later, then-president Trump unilaterally withdrew the United States from the agreement and reimposed heavy sanctions against Iran.
Search for solutions
A year later, Iran started to gradually roll back its commitments to the nuclear deal, which only allowed Tehran to enrich uranium to 3.65 percent purity.
The IAEA says Iran has considerably increased its reserves of enriched uranium to 60 percent, close to the 90 percent needed to develop an atomic bomb.
The head of the IAEA "will do what he can to prevent the situation going from bad to worse" given the significant differences between Tehran and Western capitals, analyst Ali Vaez, an Iran expert for the Crisis Group, a US-based think tank, told AFP.
"The one who left the agreement was not Iran, it was America," Iran's government spokeswoman Fatemeh Mohajerani said on Wednesday.
"Mr. Trump once tried the path of maximum pressure and saw that this path did not work."
Grossi's visit comes only two days after the defense minister of Iran's arch enemy Israel warned that Iran was "more exposed than ever to strikes on its nuclear facilities".
The two countries have exchanged missile fire in recent months in a context of high tensions in the Middle East due to the war waged by Israel in the Gaza Strip against Hamas and in Lebanon against Hezbollah, two militant groups allied with Iran.
Trump's return to the White House in January also raises fears of rising tensions between Iran and his country.
"The margins for maneuver are beginning to shrink," Grossi warned in an interview with AFP on Tuesday, adding that "it is imperative to find ways to reach diplomatic solutions".
Religious decree
Grossi has said that while Iran does not have any nuclear weapons at this moment in time, it does have plenty of nuclear materials that could be used eventually to make a weapon.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, who came to office in July with hopes of improving ties with the West and having sanctions lifted, favors a revival of the nuclear deal.
But all efforts to get the nuclear agreement off life support have so far failed.
The IAEA chief has repeatedly called for more cooperation from Iran.
In recent years, Tehran has decreased its interaction with the UN agency by deactivating surveillance devices needed to monitor the nuclear program and effectively barring its inspectors.
The foundations of Iran's nuclear program date back to the late 1950s, when the United States signed a civil cooperation agreement with Iran's then Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.
In 1970, Iran ratified the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which requires signatory states to declare and place their nuclear materials under the IAEA control.
But with Iran threatening to hit back at Israel for its latest missile strikes, some lawmakers in Iran have called on the government to revise its nuclear doctrine to pursue nuclear weapons.
The parliamentarians called on supreme leader Ali Khamenei, who wields ultimate authority in Iran, to reconsider his long-standing religious edict or fatwa banning nuclear weapons.
Iran has maintained its policy against acquiring nuclear weapons, insisting its nuclear activities are entirely peaceful.

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Trump Administration Cancels Travel for Refugees Already Cleared to Resettle in the US

An Afghan refugee man, who asked not to use his name and not to show his face fearing his identity could lead to his capture, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2025. (AP)
An Afghan refugee man, who asked not to use his name and not to show his face fearing his identity could lead to his capture, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2025. (AP)
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Trump Administration Cancels Travel for Refugees Already Cleared to Resettle in the US

An Afghan refugee man, who asked not to use his name and not to show his face fearing his identity could lead to his capture, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2025. (AP)
An Afghan refugee man, who asked not to use his name and not to show his face fearing his identity could lead to his capture, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2025. (AP)

Refugees who had been approved to travel to the United States before a deadline next week suspending America's refugee resettlement program have had their travel plans canceled by the Trump administration.

Thousands of refugees who fled war and persecution and had gone through a sometimes yearslong process to start new lives in America are now stranded at various locations worldwide. That includes more than 1,600 Afghans who assisted America's war effort, as well as relatives of active-duty US military personnel.

President Donald Trump paused the refugee resettlement program this week as part of a series of executive orders cracking down on immigration. His move had left open the possibility that refugees who had been screened to come to the US and had flights booked before the Jan. 27 deadline might be able to get in under the wire.

But in an email dated Tuesday and reviewed by The Associated Press, the US agency overseeing refugee processing and arrivals told staff and stakeholders that "refugee arrivals to the United States have been suspended until further notice."

There are a little more than 10,000 refugees from around the world who had already gone through the lengthy refugee admission process and had travel scheduled over the next few weeks, according to a document obtained by the AP. It was not immediately clear how many of those had been set to arrive by upcoming deadline.

Among those are more than 1,600 Afghans cleared to come to the US as part of the program that the Biden administration set up after the American withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021.

Many veterans of America's longest war have tried for years to help Afghans they worked with, in addition to their families, find refuge in the US. Many were prepared for a suspension of the resettlement program but had hoped for special consideration for the Afghans.

"The Trump administration’s early pause of refugee flights is alarming, leaving thousands of Afghan allies in fear and uncertainty," said Shawn VanDiver, a Navy veteran and head of #AfghanEvac, a coalition supporting Afghan resettlement efforts. "We are ready to partner to fix this and urge clear communication with impacted families. Let’s honor our promises and uphold America’s values."

There is a separate path — the special immigrant visa program— specifically for Afghans who worked directly with the US government. VanDiver's group said that program, set up by Congress, did not appear to be affected at this time.

Trump's order signed Monday had given the State Department a week before it began to halt all processing and traveling. It appears the timing was moved up, though it was not immediately clear what prompted the change.

The State Department referred questions to the White House.

Agencies that help refugees settle and adjust to life in America have argued that this is the type of legal immigration that Trump and his supporters say they like and have pointed to the stringent background checks and sometimes yearslong wait that refugees endure before setting foot in America.

"This abrupt halt to refugee admissions is devastating for families who have already endured unimaginable hardship and waited years for the chance to rebuild their lives in safety," Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, head of Global Refuge, one of the 10 US resettlement agencies, said in a statement Wednesday.

"Refugees go through one of the most rigorous vetting processes in the world, and many are now seeing their travel canceled just days, or even hours, before they were set to begin their new lives in the United States," she said. "It’s utterly heartbreaking."

Refugees are distinct from people who come directly to the US-Mexico border with the goal of eventually seeking asylum. Refugees must be living outside of the US to be considered for resettlement and are usually referred to the State Department by the United Nations.

While the resettlement program has historically enjoyed bipartisan support, the first Trump administration also temporarily halted resettlement and then lowered the number of refugees who could enter the country annually.