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Doubts and inconsistencies in IAEA report on Iran’s nukes

Careful examination of the “alleged studies” documents has revealed inconsistencies and other anomalies that give evidence of fraud. But the IAEA, the United States and its allies in the IAEA continue to treat the documents as though there were no question about their authenticity.

IAEA report on Iran contains falsified information allegedly supplied by Israel, Moral Outrage, 11 Nov 11 The Hindu reports that the latest report of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Iran appears to have falsified information about a Russian scientist who allegedly helped Tehran advance its nuclear weapons program. The IAEA report published by a Washington think tank Tuesday included a sensational claim that a former Soviet nuclear weapons scientist had helped Iran construct a detonation system that could be used for a nuclear weapon.

However, the Russian media has found out that the scientist, Vyacheslav Danilenko, had never worked in nuclear physics but their field of expertise was instead the production of nanodiamonds by explosion. Nanodiamonds are used in the manufacture of lubricants and rubber.

Contacted by the Russian daily newspaper Kommersant, the 76-year-old scientist, now retired, refused to discuss his work in Iran, saying only: “I’m not a nuclear physicist and I’m not a father of Iran’s nuclear programme.”

A former colleague, Vladimir Padalko, confirmed Mr. Danilenko’s words. “I explained to them that nanodiamonds have nothing to do with nuclear weapons,” Mr. Padalko told Kommersant.

So the truth appears to be that Mr. Danilenko is not a nuclear physicist and has never worked in the field of nuclear weapons, contrary to the claim made in the IAEA report.

Investigative journalist Gareth Porter adds:
The IAEA and David Albright, the director of the International Institute for Science and Security in Washington, never bothered to check the accuracy of a claim by an unnamed “Member State” on which the IAEA based its assertion about his nuclear weapons background.

Albright gave a “private briefing” for “intelligence professionals” last week, in which he named Danilenko as the foreign expert who had been contracted by Iran’s Physics Research Centre in the mid-1990s and identified him as a “former Soviet nuclear scientist”, according to a story by Joby Warrick of the Washington Post on Nov. 5. The Danilenko story then went worldwide.

The fact that the IAEA and Albright were made aware of Danilenko’s nanodiamond work in Iran before embracing the “former Soviet nuclear weapons specialist” story makes their failure to make any independent inquiry into his background even more revealing.

Careful examination of the “alleged studies” documents has revealed inconsistencies and other anomalies that give evidence of fraud. But the IAEA, the United States and its allies in the IAEA continue to treat the documents as though there were no question about their authenticity.

November 14, 2011 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Iran, secrets,lies and civil liberties