Has Europe given Iran an impossible nuclear ultimatum?

Iranians have said a zero enrichment position is going to be a non-starter

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader. He will potentially have to accept an end to Iran's nuclear programme to stop Israeli attacks. AFP

European negotiators have insisted Iran must accept that it cannot enrich uranium as part of its nuclear programme, so that peace can return to the Middle East, experts told The National.

It is understood that Iran has been agreeable to limiting enrichment to 3.67 per cent, which is the standard level required for civilian nuclear reactors and was part of the previous nuclear agreement.

But even this amount is unacceptable to the three European countries, Britain, France and Germany, currently holding talks with Iran in Geneva.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot, left, UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy, second left, Germany's Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul, second right, and EU foreign affairs chief Kaja Kallas before their meeting with Iran's foreign minister in Geneva. EPA

“The Europeans have now started insisting on zero as well, which the Iranians have said is going to be a non-starter,” said Darya Dolzikova, an expert on nuclear proliferation at the Rusi think tank.

Iran has engaged in years of brinkmanship by defying international inspectors to enrich uranium to near weapons-grade level. Until the Israeli attacks of the last week, the threat of an assault on its installations seemed to have “lacked some credibility for the Iranians”.

In recent days the regime has appeared to accept the 3.67 per cent figure as a negotiating position, the same amount agreed under the 2015 JCPOA nuclear agreement.

Just hours before talks were scheduled to begin in Geneva, France said it had changed its position and now believed that Iran should go towards zero enrichment. France has previously not deviated from the JCPOA position, yet this an unsurprising development considering France’s tough stance on Iran since the early 2000s, said Benjamin Hautecouverture, a nuclear expert at the Foundation for Strategic Research think tank in Paris.

“This position is about taking a maximalist position in order to ensure Iran’s nuclear programme has no future,” Mr Hautecouverture said. “It cannot be the start of balanced negotiations. Rather, it is a posture of extreme firmness which consists of saying either you accept or it, or the regime falls.”

Laure Foucher, a senior Middle East research fellow at the FRS, warned that France would be viewed by regional partners as not wanting a negotiated settlement to the crisis despite saying it does.

“This apparently contradictory position may signal that there are different ways of thinking among French decision makers, between those that join Germany’s position that Israel is doing the dirty work for us in Iran, and others who fear chaos in the region," Ms Foucher said.

For any deal to last it will have to be signed off by US President Donald Trump who has also insisted on zero enrichment, said Richard Pater, director of Bicom, the Anglo-Israeli think tank.

“It all depends on whether 3.67 is acceptable to Trump or whether he's insisting on no enrichment whatsoever,” he said. “But it's also this question of whether Trump will accept that [3.67 per cent] to get the big peace deal that he wants. Israel will then have no choice but to acquiesce to the American position.”

Ms Dolzikova also argued that the Iranians would not agree to a deal that “doesn't involve the United States as they are the critical players”.

But Israel itself has insisted that it will not back down until Iran completely ends its nuclear programme and has made clear that any uranium enrichment on Iranian soil is something that it will not accept.

Hasan Al Hasan, a nuclear expert at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, suggested that the 3.67 per cent figure was now redundant as “there is no indication that Israel is in a mood to negotiate”.

Having achieved near total freedom of action in the skies, Israel was likely to “press ahead with its maximalist war objectives of eliminating Iran’s nuclear and missile programmes and perhaps even regime change”.

He added that Mr Trump’s announcement that he would make no decision on joining the attacks - that would benefit from America’s massive bunker-busting bombs - for the next two weeks was a signal for Israel to “get the job done” in that period.

But there is also a question whether within that fortnight window Israel, without US bombs, has the capability to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities.

“Israel is obviously probably more bullish right now and looking for the removal of the whole nuclear project in its entirety, but it remains to be seen whether that's in their gift,” said Ms Dolzikova.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in Geneva on Friday. EPA

There is also a fear that if 3.67 per cent is agreed by Iran then it might in secret enrich uranium, and conduct a nuclear weaponisation programme viewing it as the only effective deterrent.

“If the regime survives this, then 3.67 per cent gives them another basis with which to start again,” said Mr Pater. “Israel is under no illusion the Iranians given the chance, will do it all over again.”

Think tank Crisis Group's Iran project director Ali Vaez said it was also important to look at what Iran was ready to put on the table to persuade Mr Trump to force an end to the war. “As for what that should entail, though few in Tehran will want to hear it, the best course of action – perhaps the only one on offer now that can stave off US military involvement – is to concede that Iran will no longer enrich uranium on its sovereign soil,” he said.

Iran could accept the principle of entering a multinational nuclear consortium with regional states, with the US as a stakeholder with international monitoring, Mr Vaez said. As part of a cessation of hostilities, Iran could also agree to a reciprocal non-aggression pledge with Israel.