Syria to give IAEA inspectors immediate access to former nuclear sites

Euronews

2 days ago

Syria's new government has agreed to give UN inspectors access to suspected former nuclear sites immediately, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has said.
Rafael Grossi confirmed the development after talks with Syria's interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa and other officials in Damascus.
The UN agency's aim is "to bring total clarity over certain activities that took place in the past that were, in the judgement of the agency, probably related to nuclear weapons", Grossi said.
He described the new Syrian government as "committed to opening up to the world, to international cooperation", and expressed hope that the inspection process could be completed within months.
In 2024, an IAEA team visited some sites of interest while former President Bashar al-Assad was still in power.
Since al-Assad's fall in December, the IAEA has been seeking to restore access to sites associated with Syria's nuclear programme.
Under the former dictator's rule, Syria is believed to have operated an extensive clandestine nuclear programme, which included an undeclared nuclear reactor built by North Korea in the eastern province of Deir el-Zour.
The IAEA described the reactor as being "not configured to produce electricity," raising the concern that Damascus sought to construct a nuclear bomb there by producing weapons-grade plutonium.
The reactor site only became public knowledge after Israel destroyed the facility in airstrikes in 2007.
Syria later levelled the site and never responded fully to the IAEA's questions about it.
Grossi said inspectors plan to return to the reactor in Deir el-Zour as well as to three other sites.
A miniature neutron source reactor in Damascus and a facility in Homs that can process yellow-cake uranium are among the sites under IAEA safeguards.
While there are no indications that there have been releases of radiation from the sites, Grossi said the watchdog is concerned that "enriched uranium can be lying somewhere and could be reused, could be smuggled, could be trafficked".
He said al-Sharaa, who has courted Western governments since taking power, had shown a "very positive disposition to talk to us and to allow us to carry out the activities we need to".
Apart from resuming inspections, Grossi said the IAEA is prepared to transfer equipment for nuclear medicine and to help rebuild the radiotherapy, nuclear medicine and oncology infrastructure in a health system severely weakened by nearly 14 years of civil war.
"And the president has expressed to me he's interested in exploring, in the future, nuclear energy as well," Grossi said.
A number of other countries in the region, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Jordan, are pursuing nuclear energy in some form.
Grossi said Syria would most likely be looking into small modular reactors, which are cheaper and easier to deploy than traditional large ones.
PSG's Champions League triumph wrapped an incredible football season in Europe.
Luis Enrique's team crushed Inter 5-0 in the Munich final, winning an historic treble, and making it the biggest margin ever in a major international football showdown.
It is worth noting, however, that Ajax beat AC Milan 6-0 in the last leg of the 1974 UEFA Super Cup, although the trophy is not widely regarded as a major one.
PSG's win also marked a long-awaited milestone in the Champions League era.
They now hold the record for the longest gap between a club's first Champions League appearance and their first title: 31 years, according to data analysed by AceOdds.com.
The team also became the only one to have seven different goalscorers in a single Champions League match, following their 7-0 win over Brest on 19 February: Barcola, Kvaratskhelia, Vitinha, Doué, Mendes, Ramos and Mayulu.
Inter's 5-0 thrashing however should not overshadow their extraordinary run to the final.
True to the great Italian tradition of defending, the Nerazzurri set an incredible record by going 539 minutes without conceding a single goal from the start of the tournament, despite playing against top opponents such as Manchester City and Arsenal.
The previous record was held by Manchester United, who kept opposition teams out for 481 minutes in the 2010-11 season when they got all the way to the final.
Although Barcelona didn't make it to the final, many of their players broke individual records.
Starting with Rafinha, the 28-year-old Brazilian matched Cristiano Ronaldo's 2014 record for the most goal involvements in a single Champions League season: 21 in total, thanks to an astonishing 13 goals and 8 assists.
That wasn't the only individual record set by the Catalans. Described as one of the most difficult opponents to face by several players, Lamine Yamal became the youngest footballer to ever score in a Champions League semi-final, at just 17, against Inter.
That smashes Kylian Mbappe's previous record, set at 18 years of age when he scored for Monaco in the 2016-17 campaign.
There was some joy for Bayern Munich and Real Madrid, too.
Thomas Müller extended his record for the most appearances for a single club in the Champions League era to 163, while Harry Kane became the first player to ever score a hat-trick of penalties, in September's game against Dinamo Zagreb.
When it comes to appearances, Real Madrid bumped their record with 28 straight seasons in the competition, as well as extended their streak of reaching the knockouts 28 times in a row.
Similarly, their former manager, Carlo Ancelotti, now at Brazil, extended his record for managerial appearances to 218 and further increased his record for Champions League victories by reaching 124.
On the other hand, Girona and Feyenoord broke the record for the most own goals in a single Champions League season, with four each, breaking Fenerbahçe's previous record of three own goals in the 2007-08 season.
At the same time, Feynoord's Austrian defender Gernot Trauner became the first player to ever score two own goals in a single UCL game, in a 6-1 loss to Lille in January.