Iran’s president reappoints UN-sanctioned official to lead atomic agency
Mohammad Eslami, who worked for years in Iran’s military industries, remains blacklisted for alleged role in nuclear proliferation and nuclear arms development
TEHRAN, Iran — Iran’s newly-elected president reappointed a US-educated official who came under United Nations sanctions 16 years ago as head of the country’s nuclear department, state TV reported Saturday.
Mohammad Eslami, 67, will continue his work as chief of Iran’s civilian nuclear program and serve as one of several vice presidents. Eslami’s reappointment by Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian comes as the country remains under heavy sanctions by the West following the collapse of the 2015 deal that curbed Iran’s nuclear activities in exchange for sanctions relief.
Pezeshkian had said during his presidential campaign that he would try to revive the nuclear deal.
The United Nations sanctioned Eslami in 2008 for “being engaged in, directly associated with or providing support for Iran’s proliferation of sensitive nuclear activities or for the development of nuclear weapon delivery systems” when he was the head of Iran’s Defense Industries Training and Research Institute.
He was appointed as the chief of Iran’s nuclear department for the first time by late Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi in 2021, before that, from 2018, in moderate former Iranian president Hassan Rouhani’s era, Eslami served as Transport and Urban Development Minister.
He has experience working in Iran’s military industries, for years, most recently as deputy defense minister responsible for research and industry.
Eslami holds degrees in civil engineering from Detroit University of Michigan and the University of Toledo, Ohio.
Since the collapse of the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers following the US’s unilateral withdrawal from the accord in 2018, Iran has pursued nuclear enrichment just below weapons-grade levels. Western powers say there is no credible civilian reason for that. Iran says its aims are entirely peaceful, but officials have recently said the Islamic Republic could change its “nuclear doctrine” if it is attacked or its existence is seen as threatened by Israel, prompting alarm at the International Atomic Energy Agency and in Western capitals.
