January 9, 2003
This week, FPA speaks with David Albright, President of the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) and outside analyst for the UN International Atomic Energy Agency.
The International Atomic Energy Agency, which operates under the United Nations, has obviously come under a lot of pressure over the past few months as inspections in Iraq heat up and North Korea has resumed operation at its Yongbyon nuclear facility, where it recently dismissed IAEA inspectors and removed surveillance equipment. Could you give us a brief overview of the IAEA and its role in both Iraq and North Korea?
The International Atomic Energy Agency is critical in providing verification under various regimes. Its principal mandate comes under the non-proliferation treaty and that's what guides its actions in North Korea, Iran, Algeria, Europe, in fact all over the world.
In the case of Iraq, the principal guiding force now is a resolution created by the UN Security Council, 687, that gives the IAEA extraordinary rights to do inspections in Iraq because they were caught cheating on the non-proliferation treaty and trying to create nuclear weapons. There are actually two different regimes that IAEA works with. The team in Iraq has incredible rights of access and obligations, even to the extent that it has the right to take Iraqis out of the country for interviewing. In the case of North Korea, the rights given for inspections under the non-proliferation treaty are actually relatively weak compared with those in Iraq. Because of what happened in North Korea in the early 90s, the rights of the inspectors were weakened even further.
Essentially all that they were doing was verifying that facilities remained shut down. So they weren't even doing inspections required under the non-proliferation treaty. Under this 1994 agreed framework, they would resume those inspections at a certain date in the future that is tied to progress on constructing the light water reactors that are also provided under the agreed framework. What's happened is that the two inspectors who were there checking that the freeze remained intact were asked to leave. What is wanted now is at least to get those two inspectors back to monitor a re-frozen North Korean program and to perhaps accelerate the inspection process in North Korea. In particular, you would want to accelerate an inspections process that would verify that North Korea has dismantled its uranium enrichment program.
They don't strike me as being very assertive. They're too tied to not rocking the boat in a member-state. They don't want to be attacked.
This would be very labor-intensive on the part of the IAEA. There is a tremendous amount on the plate for the IAEA in both Iraq and North Korea.
There has also been some controversy over a proposed nuclear power plant to be constructed in Iran, although officials have stated that it would be for energy purposes only. Is this cause for concern?
Iran is suspected of having a secret nuclear weapon program. The agency really doesn't have the tool to detect it. Iran is not cooperating fully in creating those new tools and so you have a real problem in how to implement effective inspections under the non-proliferation treaty.
But in regards to the most recent controversy in Iran over the opposed nuclear power plant at Bushehr, officials have stated that they would allow spent fuel to be inspected…
The suspicions concerning Iran's nuclear weapons program has little to do with Bushehr. There is concern that they have other facilities, two of which we were able to identify with satellite imagery which were released to CNN about a month ago. One looks like a heavy water plant and one looks like a uranium enrichment facility that the IAEA has never been to. The Iranian government canceled the visit of the IAEA to visit those sites, and it didn't look like they were going to let the IAEA come later. The reason we released the photos, in essence, was to force Iran to say to the IAEA “You can come” and now if Iran doesn't let them come, everyone will know why. But again, the IAEA should have been at those sites months ago, years ago, and they should have heard about them when Iran planned to build them.
In general, the new inspections regimes are harder to do. It's getting into this issue of how do you detect small scale, secret uranium enrichment programs, plutonium production programs, what are the indicators of that and if you see an indicator, how do you act upon it?
So it's a real headache for the IAEA to know what's going on in Iran.
On that note, is the agency equipped to handle not only two, but maybe three major crisis?
No, I don't think they're equipped now to handle it. They're under funded and they have a cultural problem. For example, why didn't we hear about the situation in Iran? Why did it take a crisis to reveal it publicly? And they act like they have all the time in the world in the case of Iran. I think that one of the problems they face is they just don't focus enough on asking hard questions of countries. To say, “We really want you to convince us that you don't have undeclared activities.” In the case of Algeria, which is not a high priority to anyone now, we (ISIS) did a historical study of Algeria and its past nuclear program, which we think ended in the early 90's. Senior IAEA officials said to us “To ask questions of a government is to criticize them,” We were asking ‘Did you have a bomb program?' It's on our website. We had a pretty direct confrontation over this study.
Aside from asking tougher questions, what changes do you think the IAEA needs to make in response to these crises?
One is to get more money. I mean, they really have to beef up their staff and get more resources. They're always kept at a zero budget or even a negative growth in certain areas, and they just have to get more money from the member-states. And this isn't the IAEA's fault by any means, but it is the fault of the member-states. They're starving this agency for money, and yet demanding that it do more and more. This is work in areas that are critical to whether there will be war or peace. It should be a no-brainer to give them a lot of money. If they can work successfully in Iraq, maybe then a war is avoided.
If Iraq thinks the IAEA can be tricked, because they see it as ineffective, then we may go to war because Iraq miscalculated.
If the agency is able to work effectively in North Korea, it may provide the confidence that is the answer to the hardliners here. North Korea can abide by its commitments not to have nuclear weapons.
And I suppose financial support also is closely related to political support. In a lot of these cases we're dealing with very diplomatically sensitive situations, obviously in North Korea, Iraq, in all of these places. How does that affect the process and the IAEA's ability to operate?
It's not good that the U.S. government has been attacking the IAEA in its work in Iraq and Unmovic too. It's not been good that for months we've had people like the Vice President and the Secretary of Defense trashing inspections in Iraq. That was very damaging and it was very wrong. They were very ignorant comments, actually, if you just assess them based on what was said. And so it is important that the government support the agency and work to improve it.
I mean, finally it's a creation of nations and nations have to work to improve it. That's why I still am a critic. But we work actively to improve the effectiveness of the IAEA inspections in the work we've done with the U.S. government and in the work we've done independently of governments. So, while we're critical, we're very supportive of the agency, but do see that it has to improve.
Unfortunately, we have to pay much more attention to the possibility of nuclear terrorism. I think that in the focus of North Korea and Iraq, we've lost sight of some the fears raised by al Qaeda, but those fears are still there.
They often make the wrong choices and underneath it, they have a certain amount of money and cannot do both. They have three options, and they choose the cheapest, which often means they're not effective. But overriding this, there is a cultural problem where they just don't ask enough questions, they're not suspicious enough, and it's at the top leadership.
Why do you think that is?
I don't know. I suspect it's generational. A lot of the top people have been around a long time. They operated at a time the agency could only beg for things. They don't strike me as being very assertive. They're too tied to not rocking the boat in a member-state. They don't want to be attacked. That used to be a problem. I mean, if an inspector went some place and said ‘something funny is going on here,' it better be a pretty powerful inspector, because when that member-state goes and complains to the IAEA, there could be a tremendous amount of penalties brought to bear on that inspector. So they were not encouraged to be inquisitive.
In general, the new inspections regimes are harder to do. It's getting into this issue of how do you detect small scale, secret uranium enrichment programs, plutonium production programs, what are the indicators of that and if you see an indicator, how do you act upon it? That's why, going back to this cultural issue, why it really matters. When you may see a funny little procurement or there may be something suspicious in a satellite image. You better have a smoking gun before you suspect me to go confront that government. What it should be is, ‘Look, here's something funny, let's go ask that government and right away, what does this mean and can we go there?'
I think I recall reading something you had said regarding that satellite imagery is simply not enough that you need people on the ground, that inspectors are the most valuable tool that we have.
Definitely. The satellite images can be useful to trigger on-site inspections. But you have to exercise your rights and I think there has been a hesitancy in the agency to do that and also I think they're too secretive. We constantly have battles over secrecy. We think that they are over the top on secrecy and it hurts them because they start to pull their punches, they're not as accountable to the international community. On the other side, they don't educate the people about what they're doing. People often attack them and they have no real response because they're so secretive.
I'd like to talk a little bit about your organization, The Institute for Science and International Security, an organization that's dedicated to informing the public about science and policy issues affecting the international security. What are some of the other nuclear security issues that you think Americans really should be aware of through 2003 aside from Iraq and North Korea, as well as Iran?
Just to wrap up this other discussion, I think people really have to understand that non-military options to solve crises are critical to develop, and they have to be multilateral. If they're nuclear, they're going to involve the IAEA or what we would call the IAEA -plus. It might be bilateral inspection arrangements, but multilateralism and verification is critical for improved security worldwide.
Finally it's a creation of nations and nations have to work to improve it. That's why I still am a critic. But we work actively to improve the effectiveness of the IAEA inspections in the work we've done with the U.S. government and in the work we've done independently of governments. So, while we're critical, we're very supportive of the agency.
And while this is true in Iraq, Iran, and North Korea, it's also going to be true in Russia to make sure and have greater confidence that nuclear material doesn't go missing there and if I can just mention that that problem remains profound. Russia needs to dramatically improve its protection and accounting of its nuclear material, it's going to have to have U.S. assistance to do that. Another issue is that, unfortunately, we have to pay much more attention to the possibility of nuclear terrorism. I think that in the focus of North Korea and Iraq, we've lost sight of some the fears raised by al Qaeda, but those fears are still there. We do have to worry that a terrorist group will attack us or our allies or someone else with a dirty bomb and eventually we have to worry that they will attack with a crude nuclear explosive.
What kind of impact do you think some of these issues will have on, say, domestic policy? Will the situation in a place like N. Korea give the administration a reason to go ahead with the missile defense program and how will the status of security within our own nuclear facilities at home be dealt with?
They've used North Korea as the main reason to get a ballistic missile defense. I think what's been shown, is that's not much of a defense. You do need a diplomatic strategy, you need engagement, and deal with the problem in North Korea, you can't just pull back and say, ‘Oh, I'm going to protect my borders' and the reason is simple. We have allies that have ballistic missile defenses, such as South Korea. If in a crisis North Korea launches a missile at Japan, it's possible that you'd shoot it down, but there's a chance you won't.
Then the other thing is that only engagement can turn North Korea to a policy that leads it to be a more civilized nation. Threats don't work and ignoring North Korea doesn't work. You have to worry about that and I think that in an odd, ironic way the U.S. public has responded. North Korea could launch an attack against us, therefore we're scared of North Korea, and we better deal with North Korea, not just create a ballistic missile defense. I think that's what you saw in the polls, is that people were significantly more threatened personally by North Korea than Iraq.
On the physical protection of facilities here, it is a big worry and I don't think we've seen the end of terrorism and I do worry that we're going to have to deal with some nuclear terrorism. One aspect of nuclear terrorism is an attack on one of our nuclear facilities to force the release of radiation, to seize it for some reason, g-d knows what. And so I think that it's disturbing that the NRC is kind of ignoring this problem and acting as if it's not their problem and I understand why, it's extremely expensive to deal with these new kinds of threats. They may feel they can't and therefore they have to get away from it. But you can't do that and you do have to worry about inadequate security at all our nuclear sites, both at the civil domain, which is the NRC and also on the nuclear weapons side, which is under the Department of Energy and the Department of Defense.
David, thank you so much for taking to time to talk with us.