A snap inspection for Syria?

Former International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) official Ollie Heinonen wants a special inspection of Syria’s suspected nuclear sites: [T]he IAEA has reached a point where a special inspection is warranted at Deir Al-Zour (destroyed in a reported Israeli air strike in 2007) and other locations that could be functionally related to it or that may ...

By , a professor at Indiana University’s Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies.

Former International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) official Ollie Heinonen wants a special inspection of Syria's suspected nuclear sites:

Former International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) official Ollie Heinonen wants a special inspection of Syria’s suspected nuclear sites:

[T]he IAEA has reached a point where a special inspection is warranted at Deir Al-Zour (destroyed in a reported Israeli air strike in 2007) and other locations that could be functionally related to it or that may have information useful for clarifying what was going on there. The IAEA found uranium particles at the site, and satellite imagery and procurement information point toward possible construction of a nuclear reactor there. If it was a nuclear reactor, this would have been the first time that an IAEA member state and an NPT signatory constructed a plutonium production reactor on such a scale without reporting it to the IAEA. 

He acknowledges that the IAEA’s power to request a special inspection has been invoked rarely but argues that the situation in Syria warrants the use of all agency tools.

David Bosco is a professor at Indiana University’s Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies. He is the author of The Poseidon Project: The Struggle to Govern the World’s Oceans. Twitter: @multilateralist

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