Iran not forthcoming on past nuclear activities, warns IAEA
Regime’s judiciary says Iranian-Swedish Djalali’s execution will be carried out
Updated 10 May 2022
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BRUSSELS/TEHRAN: The head of the UN atomic watchdog said on Tuesday Iran was dragging its feet on information about uranium particles found at old undeclared sites in the country, raising the prospect of a clash on the issue in June.
Talks to revive Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers have been on hold since March, chiefly over Tehran’s insistence that Washington remove the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, its elite security force, from the US Foreign Terrorist Organization list.
While not technically part of the nuclear deal, one issue causing tension and distrust between Tehran and the West had been Iran’s demand for the closure of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s investigation into uranium particles found at three apparently old but undeclared sites.
Those sites suggest that Iran had nuclear material there that it did not declare to the agency. Iran and the UN nuclear watchdog had agreed to a three-month plan on March 5 for a series of exchanges after which IAEA chief Rafael Grossi “will aim to report his conclusion by the June 2022 (IAEA) Board of Governors” meeting, which begins on June 6.
However, Western diplomats have said there is little sign that Tehran has given satisfactory answers to the watchdog.
Speaking to the EU Parliament, Grossi said he remained extremely concerned by the situation and had told Iran that he found it difficult to imagine that the nuclear deal could be finalized if the IAEA had serious doubts about things that it should have known about.
“I am not trying to pass an alarmist message that we are at a dead end but the situation does not look very good. Iran has not been forthcoming in the type of information we need from them,” Grossi told European Parliament committees via webstream.
The EU’s Iran nuclear talks coordinator Enrique Mora is arriving in Tehran in what he has described as the last bullet to save the deal, which also includes Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany.
Western officials have largely lost hope that it can be resurrected, sources familiar with the matter said, forcing them to weigh how to limit Iran’s atomic program even as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has divided the big powers.
“We are, of course, still hopeful that some agreement is going to be reached within a reasonable time frame, although we have to recognize the fact that the window of opportunity could be closed any anytime,” Grossi said.
Meanwhile, the death sentence of Swedish-Iranian national Ahmadreza Djalali is on the agenda and will be carried out, Iran’s judiciary spokesperson Zabihollah Khodaian said on Tuesday, without giving a date as to when the execution will take place.
Last week, Iran’s semi-official ISNA news agency reported that the Iranian-Swedish researcher, sentenced to death on charges of spying for Israel, will be executed by May 21.
In a separate development, Iran on Tuesday described as “unacceptable” upstream dam-building by neighboring Turkey on shared waterways, calling on its neighbor to cease such activity.
“Turkey’s construction of dams on the border waters is unacceptable and we oppose it,” Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian was quoted as saying by state news agency IRNA.
He told parliament that the issue had been raised “at least three times these past months during two face-to-face meetings in New York and Tehran and a phone call with the Turkish foreign minister to express our disapproval.
“I asked him to pay particular attention to the construction of dams on the River Aras,” he added.
Amir-Abdollahian noted that while “there is no bilateral agreement ... on water cooperation, as neighbors, we asked the Turkish government four months ago to form a bilateral committee on water to respond to concerns in this domain.”
His remarks come as Iran has faced frequent droughts in recent years, caused in part by climate change, as well as dam-building in neighboring countries.
But alongside Turkey, Iran itself has been responsible for building dams on shared rivers with its neighbor Iraq, threatening access to water there.
Turkey’s dam on the Aras has nonetheless posed a particular threat to water availability in Iran.
Neither country is party to the 1997 UN Watercourses Convention that regulates the use of transnational water resources.
DUBAI: Gaza’s fishing industry — once a critical source of food, income and affordable protein — has been largely destroyed as a result of Israel’s war with Hamas, worsening the Palestinian enclave’s food security crisis.
According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, fishing activity in Gaza now stands at less than 10 percent of prewar levels following the widespread destruction of boats, ports and equipment, combined with prolonged maritime closures enforced under Israel’s naval blockade.
UN and human rights organizations estimate that up to 72 percent of Gaza’s fishing fleet has been damaged or destroyed, alongside near-total devastation of related infrastructure, including landing sites, storage facilities and repair workshops.
Israel's naval blockade has Gaza's fishing industry to decline to about a tenth of pre-war levels. (Reuters photo)
The remaining vessels are small, damaged skiffs capable of operating only meters from shore.
Ramzy Baroud, a journalist, author and editor of The Palestine Chronicle, said the destruction of Gaza’s fishing sector must be understood as part of a deliberate policy aimed at preventing Palestinians from developing independent food-producing systems.
Baroud says Israel had pursued a strategy since 1967 to foster Palestinian dependency — first on the Israeli economy, and later on humanitarian aid entering Gaza through Israeli-controlled crossings — leaving the population permanently vulnerable to economic collapse.
“This vulnerability is functional for Israel, as it allows the Israeli government and military to leverage their control over Palestinian lives through political pressure in pursuit of concessions,” he told Arab News.
Palestinians were prevented from developing local industry through restrictions on imports and exports, while much of Gaza’s arable land was seized or turned into military targets, he said.
“Likewise, the fishing sector was deliberately crippled through direct attacks on fishermen, including arrests, live fire, confiscation of equipment, and the sinking or destruction of boats,” he added.
FAO has documented widespread destruction across Gaza’s coastal fishing areas.
“In Gaza’s fishing areas now lie broken boats, torn nets, and ruined infrastructure, standing in stark contrast to the once-vibrant industry that supported thousands of fishers for generations,” Beth Bechdol, FAO deputy director-general, said in a statement.
Before the war, more than 4,000 registered fishermen worked along Gaza’s 40-kilometer coastline, supporting tens of thousands of family members and contributing to local food security in an enclave heavily dependent on imports.
Today, the majority have been stripped of their livelihoods, as access to the sea has become sporadic, dangerous, or entirely prohibited.
For decades, fishing off Gaza was restricted to shifting maritime zones — typically between three and 12 nautical miles offshore — often tightened or closed entirely during periods of escalation.
Since October 2023, when the Israel-Hamas conflict began, humanitarian organizations say there have been extended periods of total maritime closure, effectively banning fishing and depriving Gaza’s population of one of its few remaining sources of local food production.
Baroud said the assault on Gaza’s fishing sector was not a by-product of war, but part of a deliberate strategy that intensified during the conflict.
“For Gaza, the sea represents freedom,” he said. “All of Gaza’s other borders are controlled by Israel, either directly or indirectly.”
Israel had consistently worked to deny Palestinians access to the sea, he said. And despite commitments under the Oslo Accords to allow fishing up to 20 nautical miles offshore, those provisions were never honored.
“The assault on Gaza’s fishing sector is therefore not incidental,” Baroud said. “It is about severing Palestinians from one of the few spaces not entirely enclosed by walls, checkpoints, and military control.”
Israel has generally rejected or not accepted accusations that it is unlawfully targeting Gaza’s fishermen, framing incidents at sea as enforcement of security zones or as under investigation rather than deliberate attacks on civilians.
In past lethal incidents at sea highlighted by Human Rights Watch, the Israel Defense Forces have typically said boats “deviated from the designated fishing zone” and that forces fired after warnings were ignored.
According to FAO, rebuilding Gaza’s fishing sector will be impossible without a fundamental change in access and security conditions.
“For Gazans, the sea was not just a source of food, but a source of livelihood and identity,” Bechdol said.
“FAO can assist to help rebuild Gaza’s fishing industry. But for this to happen, peace must first be established and fishers must be allowed to operate their boats and cast their nets without fear of harm.”
Ciro Fiorillo, head of the FAO office for the West Bank and Gaza, said the agency is primed to offer assistance once the security situation improves.
“FAO is ready to restart projects, replenish damaged boats and equipment, and inject emergency funds as soon as these key fishing inputs for production are allowed to enter the Strip, a sustained ceasefire is in place, and access to the sea is restored,” Fiorillo said in a statement.
Since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on southern Israel triggered the Israeli military assault on Gaza, much of the enclave has been flattened, tens of thousands killed, and some 90 percent of the population displaced.
Even since the ceasefire came into effect with the exchange of hostages and prisoners in October last year, pockets of violence have continued and humanitarian needs remain dire. The collapse of fishing has only compounded an already catastrophic food crisis.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has repeatedly warned that the destruction of food-producing systems — including agriculture, fisheries and markets — has pushed Gaza toward famine, with households facing extreme shortages of protein and calories.
With farmland destroyed, livestock killed and imports severely restricted, fish was once among the few foods that could still be sourced locally.
Its near disappearance has driven prices beyond reach for most families and increased dependence on limited humanitarian aid.
“This is about denying Palestinians access to life itself — to survival,” said Baroud.
The destruction of fishing forces Palestinians into deeper dependence on humanitarian aid that Israel itself controls, effectively weaponizing food rather than allowing Palestinians to sustain themselves independently, he said.
Human rights groups documenting maritime enforcement report that fishermen attempting to operate — even close to the shore — face gunfire, pursuit, detention and arrest, contributing to a climate in which fishing has become a life-threatening activity rather than a livelihood.
According to rights monitors, the destruction of larger vessels has eliminated the possibility of reaching deeper waters, forcing the few remaining fishermen to operate in unsafe, shallow zones with damaged equipment, limited fuel and no protection.
Baroud said international law clearly obligates an occupying power to protect civilian livelihoods and ensure access to food and means of survival.
“The systematic targeting of fishermen — who are civilians engaged in subsistence activity — cannot be justified as a military necessity, especially when it results in starvation and famine,” Baroud said.
He said the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits collective punishment, the destruction of civilian infrastructure and the targeting of livelihoods.
The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights has described the restriction of Gaza’s fishing sector as part of a broader assault on civilian survival systems, warning that the denial of access to the sea has direct implications for nutrition, employment and aid dependency.
Baroud said the recovery of Gaza’s fishing sector could not occur in isolation from the broader economy.
“Only a measure of real freedom for Palestinians — freedom of movement, access to land and sea, and the ability to import, export and produce independently — can allow Gaza’s industries and economy to recover,” he said.
Without ending the system of control governing Palestinian life, Baroud said, any discussion of reconstruction or recovery would remain hollow.
As famine warnings intensify, the fishing sector’s collapse stands as a stark example of how Gaza’s food system has fractured.
What was once a daily livelihood is now reduced to occasional, high-risk attempts to secure food.
With no functioning fleet and no safe access to waters, Gaza’s fishermen are operating at the edge of survival.
