Not only is the information that’s being publicized about Iran’s alleged nuclear activities “not new“, it’s [...]]]> The Christian Science Monitor’s Scott Peterson reports on continued suspicions that were raised about the authenticity of the information presented in the so-called Iranian “laptop of death”–2005 information which the latest IAEA report is repeating.

Not only is the information that’s being publicized about Iran’s alleged nuclear activities “not new“, it’s also based/builds on information that was doubted by experts in the first place.

News reports at the time indicated deep skepticism, when some of the laptop contents were first shown to diplomats accredited to the IAEA. In many quarters, doubt still persists. Recognizing such skepticism, one portion of the IAEA report was devoted to addressing the credibility of the information. But Mr. Kelly, the former IAEA inspector who also served as a department director at the agency, remains unconvinced.

“The first is the issue of forgeries. There is nothing to tell that those documents are real,” says Kelley, whose experience includes inspections from as far afield as Iraq and Libya, to South Africa in 1993.

“My sense when I went through the documents years ago was that there was possibly a lot of stuff in there that was genuine, [though] it was kind of junk,” says Kelly. “And there were a few rather high-quality things” like the green salt document: “That was two or three pages that wasn’t related to anything else in the package, it was on a different topic, and you just wondered, was this salted in there for someone to find?”

It would not be the first time that data was planted. He recalls 1993 and 1994, when the IAEA received “very complex forgeries” on Iraq that slowed down nuclear investigations there by a couple of years.

“Those documents had markings on them, and were designed to resemble Iraqi documents, but when we dug into them they were clearly forgeries,” adds Kelley. “They were designed by a couple of member states in that region, and provided to the Agency maliciously to slow things down.”

The [...]]]> The timing of the recently released IAEA report about Iran is curious, especially considering its content which analysts agree is mostly “not new.” It has nevertheless been made public at a time when tension between the U.S. and Iran is high and the U.S. is pushing for more sanctions against Iran. Why?

The IAEA is supposed to be a neutral body, but a 2009 WikiLeaks cable featured in the Guardian shows that the U.S. strongly approved of IAEA chief, Yukiya Amano, specifically because of his approach to Iran, which he emphasized would be different than Mohamed ElBaradei’s.

In a meeting with Ambassador on the eve of the two-week Board of Governors (BoG) and General Conference (GC) marathon of mid-September, IAEA Director General-designate Yukiya Amano thanked the U.S. for having supported his candidacy and took pains to emphasize his support for U.S. strategic objectives for the Agency. Amano reminded Ambassador on several occasions that he would need to make concessions to the G-77, which correctly required him to be fair-minded and independent, but that he was solidly in the U.S. court on every key strategic decision, from high-level personnel appointments to the handling of Iran‘s alleged nuclear weapons program.

This is the U.S.’s initial assessment of him:

9. (SBU) Comment: By the time he departed Vienna with the GC’s confirmation of his appointment, Amano appeared comfortable in his “Director General” shoes. He speaks with increasing confidence and clarity, having mastered his talking points and grown accustomed to his new title. Apprehensions linger among IAEA staff and diplomatic missions regarding his communications and leadership abilities, but with his performance during the GC he made progress in winning over skeptics. His wisdom in downplaying Japanese visibility among his senior advisors will also assuage staff fears that Amano would subvert the Agency with a Japanese corporate management style. On a grander stage, Amano’s global political savvy was clearly in evidence, and his willingness to speak candidly with U.S. interlocutors on his strategy and various balancing acts bodes well for our future relationship. For example, his description of President Obama’s Nuclear Security Summit as the biggest event of his early tenure was a deliberate and gratifying gesture.