Iran Ready to swap Uranium inside Turkey

Iranian government on 17 May2010 signed an agreement with Turkey and Brazil in Tehran to swap low enriched Uranium for high-enriched Uranium within Turkish boundaries. According to the agreement, Iran will keep 1,200kg of its low-enriched Uranium inside Turkey until it gets fuel for Tehran medical research reactor. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will have supervision over the uranium kept inside Turkey. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinijad finalised the agreement with Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

According to an agreement mediated by IAEA in October 2009, Iran had to export low enriched Uranium to Russia for further enrichment and then to France for processing into fuel.  Iran had insisted to carry out these transactions within its own boundaries. However, IAEA and western powers like America refused to oblige Iran. They asked Iran to Exchange Uranium for fuel outside the Iranian boundaries which was not accepted by Iran then.

The above agreement is important as it ended the tension between Iran and America. Recently, America had accused Iran of carrying out nuclear energy programme for military purposes. Iran had denied the allegations and claimed that any nuclear programme is only for peaceful purposes. In case of no agreement, Iran could have faced economic sanctions from America. Iran has shown tendency to cooperate with the world community rather than to confront it. The agreement is a step in the direction of maintaining peace in the world.

• IAEA is an international organisation, which aims at promoting peaceful use of nuclear energy.
• It was set up on 29 July 1957 as an autonomous organisation.
• The headquarters of IAEA are in Vienna, capital of Austria.
• On 07 October2005 IAEA and its former director general Mohamed El Baradei were jointly awarded Nobel peace prize.
• Yukio Amano is the present director general of IAEA.