Iran may have successfully destroyed evidence of nuclear-related work conducted at its Parchin facility. Officials from the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog presented satellite imagery to Western officials by the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog yesterday.

Herman Nackaerts, deputy director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), made the comment during a closed-door briefing where he showed satellite imagery indicating Iran had now partly paved the site, they said. The picture was the latest sign of what Western officials suspect is an Iranian attempt since early last year to remove or hide any evidence of illicit nuclear-related activity at Parchin, located southeast of the capital Tehran.

In 2011 the International Atomic Energy Agency outlined “strong indicators of possible nuclear weapon development” at the military facility. Iran subsequently blocked investigators from the site and then began paving it over.

The destruction at Parchin has direct implications for negotiations between the U.N. investigators and Tehran. Foreign policy analysts had suggested that Iran might, in the context of those negotiations, offer access to Parchin in return for Western concessions. Now that the site has been sanitized, it would be unusual for such a gesture be seen as credible.

In response to a question, “he (Nackaerts) said there is a chance they won’t find anything”, in view of the suspected sanitization efforts, said one diplomat who was at the meeting… The IAEA said in a report to member states last week that Iran had asphalted a “significant proportion” of the specific part of Parchin it wants to inspect.

[Photo: sherlock72 / Youtube]