 Hello. Good afternoon. And you have come to discuss this. I think we'll go straight to questions. Indeed. Good afternoon. Please. Hi. How are you? Hello. Hi. If you allow me, I have two questions. First questions about the Zaporizhia. The decision of Russian authorities in the Zaporizhia, the Zaporizhia workers, is very critical, very fragile to the nuclear safety. You expressed your concern before your visit in Zaporizhia. I would ask, could you please give us a little bit details with your conversation, with your Russian authorities, how they respond on your concern, and have they closed big employer's gaps for the war? More than 11,000 now, 4,500. And what is happening actually, those workers who not accept this contract. The second question about the Middle East. Tension in the Middle East, because of the situation in Gaza, it's higher than ever, as you know. Not expected nuclear activities and nuclear weapons in Israel would make this situation in Middle East much more complicated. What do you think about it? Thank you very much. Two very important points on the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant. As you know, I was visiting. I went first to Kyiv, my ninth visit to Ukraine, the fourth to the plant itself. I had a long conversation with President Zelensky, the Minister of Energy of Ukraine, with the nuclear authorities of the country. Then I went down to the station. I have been saying that the situation continues to be fragile in a very concrete way. This weekend, for example, our teams there reported more military activity in the vicinity of the plant, which means that the physical integrity of the station is, of course, or continues to be at risk. This is a situation that is evolving day by day. We cannot say at any point that we have reached a more stable or better, I would say, situation. That is unfortunately the reality. We also continue to have problems with the external power supply. With one of the two remaining lines not being operational at the moment. The plant is really relying on just one line of power from the outside. All of this makes it for a very precarious situation. You mentioned the issue of the staff. Yes, this is the fact that a number around 100, I don't have a complete list, but a number around that of former Energoatom staff, which were invited together with many others, the whole of the remaining staff at the plant, decided to decline the offer to sign a contract with a new entity, commercial entity or operational entity that has been created there. These people, you are asking what is happening with them. They are not allowed to go back to the plant anymore. I had discussions with the management when I was visiting about the impact of the absence of some of these people or these people on the operations of the station, and they indicated that there was no direct impact. Of course, the necessary amount or levels of staffing is a very important matter that we are following very, very closely. You have to remember that the plant is at shutdown status, which means that it is operating at a very, very low regime, not producing any energy, so the amount of activities at the required levels of staff are not the same as if you were operating at full capacity. So that is one. On the middle list, of course, I have been saying that I am concerned. The middle list is a wide issue, and it has many aspects, many different aspects. Of course, what is happening in Gaza has a dimension that it is important. There were very, I would say, unhelpful comments about using nuclear weapons there. I expressed myself on those, saying that loose talk about nuclear weapons is unacceptable, so that was very clear. But from that, we have, of course, other situations in the region where, as I said to the border governors in the morning, the agency is trying to uphold the non-proliferation regime. This loose talk about nuclear weapons extends to other countries, including Iran. And other countries, not far from that region, have said that if Iran has nuclear weapons, they will have nuclear weapons as well. So there is a very concerning sort of domino thing about nuclear weapons or the potential accession to nuclear weapons that it is very concerning, and I think this must be stopped. And this is why I, as Director General of the IEA and Guardian of the Operational Aspects of the NPT must remind everybody, at least those in standing, hopefully in good standing, with the NPT, that these are obligations. These are legal obligations they have. We all have an obligation if we are within the NPT to respect it. Nuclear weapons are not acceptable. They are prohibited according to international law for those who are parties to the NPT. All right? So I continue in my efforts. I'm continuing my efforts in Iran. I will start again my efforts in Syria, which is a very important case, which has been, you know, continuing without a concrete outcome or a resolution for a long time. It's been, I think, 13 years since the IEA Board of Governors adopted a resolution regarding the situation there. And we have been talking past each other. I took an initiative to approach my Syrian counterparts and Foreign Minister Ergdat wrote to me this weekend indicating that they expect me in Syria very soon. So we are trying, as I tell you, to uphold the nonproliferation norm to the best of our abilities. Next. Hi, DG. Jonathan Tyrone, Bloomberg News. Hello. Two very brief questions. First, what do you hope to accomplish when you go to Moscow this week? What will you tell Mr. Putin on the second anniversary of the Zaporizhia seizure? And when do you leave? Okay, that's one question. Yeah, yeah, can you just answer that and I'll ask a quick follow-up? All right. So I'll answer your first question. Well, in terms of accomplishing, I don't know, I think it is very important, very important that we keep this high-level dialogue with both belligerents. I've been to Kyiv many times. I've spoken many times with President Zelensky, with President Putin once and also with other, I mean, with Minister Lavrov and others. What is happening there, as I just explained to your colleague, is of tremendous importance in terms of international peace and security. So for me, it's very important to be able to discuss with him some technical points. Of course, I was there. I was at the plant. I was discussing some issues. I want to have an impression of what are the plans there and be able to put across some important points that we believe that technically are very, very important. And you leave tomorrow, correct? In principle, yes. Of course, diplomatic practice indicates that I should leave the announcements to my Russian hosts, but it is the idea, yes. And then just very briefly, you visited Dubai at the end of January for a conference. Indeed. And you were on a panel and you said, when it comes to certain activities, you need to have a very specific provisions which could be embedded in an additional protocol. Of course, today, you called on people to adopt an additional protocol, but you also said there could be other arrangements as well. So I'm wondering what other arrangements outside of the additional protocol could be for Saudi Arabia, could be for Iran and some of the other countries that you were addressing at that forum. Well, the border governors agreed back in the day on the model additional protocol, which is the best expression of what authorities and competencies the IEA could have in order to expand its inspection and visibility. But as we know, first of all, it's not excluded. Member States may decide on other things. You have cases where a creative diplomacy, like in the case of my own country, I was working for many, many years on the ABAC, IEA, Argentina, Brazil, which I think has been serving both countries well and the international community. So this to say that the important thing is to uphold the nonproliferation norm. Of course, we know what the best way to achieve that is, and this is why the AP is a model that has been agreed after long negotiations. You were following that already. But there may be other ways. I'm not close to anything. We have clear ideas, and we hope to be able to have a technical conversation with all partners about that. Hello, Mr. Guruji. Hello. This is Ahmad Samadi from Iran International TV. Hello. I have two questions regarding to Iran. Yes. Following your recent critique of Iran's nonproliferation with the agency, Mohammad Islami, head of the Iran Atomic Energy Organization, accused the agency of interfering with Iran's access to the necessary equipment, supplies, and technology. Do you confirm these words if yes, what trouble caused by the agency? The second question is, last year, you appealed to the board members and also the international community for assistance regarding the Iran issue. Could you please update on the support you have received thus far? Can you clarify the second part? Support from other countries, you mean? No, no. You appealed the international community to support the agency regarding the Iran. Ah, yes, of course. Well, on the first one, you know that I try to avoid commenting on other people's comments. Otherwise, it turns into a sort of a snowball of indirect accusations or discussions. I have a good dialogue with Mohammad Islami and I hope to be able to talk to him in person before it's too long. So that is one thing. I don't believe, on the contrary, I think the IAEA does not interfere. The IAEA is the way to ensure cooperation international cooperation. The IAEA cannot interfere in bilateral trade or bilateral actions. So I am very surprised by this idea that the IAEA interferes. The IAEA has a competence on certain things and authority to do certain things and it does it to the best of its abilities. So I don't think the IAEA, on the contrary, the IAEA is and will always be, I would say a vehicle for more cooperation. So I hope that Iran cooperates more with us and things will be better in this regard as well. In terms of the international community, I think it's very important what you mentioned because the IAEA has the authority that is given to it by the international community. This is not an individual pursuit that I'm after. So I need the support of the border governors, I need the support of the international community at large because what is at stake here is, as I have been saying, that we don't see nuclear weapons around, that nuclear weapons are not used, nothing more, nothing less. So I hope that people take their obligations very, very seriously because actions or inactions may have consequences. As I was saying just now, other countries may have plans, et cetera. So I am really counting very seriously on the support of the international community for my work. Thank you very much. Albert Auti, DPA, Chairman Price. Hi, yes, hello. On your visit to Russia, you said you wanted to discuss technical issues without going into too much detail. Can you maybe highlight one or two or three issues or concerns that you want to bring up with President Putin? First of all, if I have such a high-level meeting, I wouldn't exclude that other issues are discussed. So I would not be coming with a fixed list of items and as it happens, when I have a meeting with a world leader that has responsibility and in particular a nuclear weapon possessor state, permanent member of the Security Council, I cannot exclude that other things are discussed. But when it comes to the plant, there are issues related to the future operational status of the plant. Is it going to be started or not? What is the idea? What is the idea in terms of the external power supply lines? Since what we see is extremely fragile and thin. So these are important matters. If it's restarted, what kind of safety evaluations are going to be made? I mean, there are many things where the agency has a role, a responsibility even, I would say. So there are many questions, I suppose, that could be discussed within this specifically technical area that I'm mentioning. Francois Murphy from Reuters. A couple of questions on Iran. You said you need the support of the board, but now quarter after quarter you sort of list all these problems that you have with Iran that are either increasing or getting worse or both. And again, we have no resolution against Iran. I realize that technically it's member states decisions, but you do have an opinion on this, at least a private one. So are you frustrated at the lack of a resolution against Iran this time? And my mind has gone blank, forgive me. Well, you're saying that... No, sorry, yes, no, sorry. Uninspectors, particularly inspectors. Forgive me. No, that's okay. At the time you mentioned that the fact that Iran had designated these inspectors and you hoped to negotiate a solution and clearly that hasn't happened. And here we are, nothing's happened and it doesn't seem like there's going to be much contact with Iran on this. Things don't seem to be moving anywhere fast. So do you think you should have handled that differently at the time? Should you have called an emergency board? Should things have been handled differently? How do you feel about that? Okay. Well, you used the word frustration. I would certainly apply the word frustration to the second, which is this issue of the designation of the inspectors. Frankly, we've been exchanging on this. It's not like there hasn't been a conversation on this, but I haven't received any positive answer on it. I hope that I will be getting that. I chose not to call an extraordinary session of the board on this, because I think it's a matter that can be resolved bilaterally without resorting to this means that would be, in my opinion, more fitting to other types of issues with other relevance. Not that this is not relevant, but I don't think it was the correct way to go. On the first one, so the other frustration. No, I don't feel frustrated about that. I think the support of the international community can be expressed in many ways. And I, in my dialogue with presidents, heads of government, foreign ministers, as you can imagine, the first thing in the agenda that I have with them is the situation in Iran. And I see that they are enormously concerned. So Iran may like or dislike this, but this is what I feel. And here is where I get this unanimous, I would say, unanimous expression that they feel that the only way forward is through cooperation with the IEA. There's no other peaceful and cooperative solution to this thing that does not pass through cooperation with the IEA. So I don't think this is absolutely necessary. It's in the wisdom of member states when they feel they want to have this. And I try to stay clear of that. Sometimes people say, do you want a resolution? Do you don't want a resolution? You know, what I want is results. And sometimes resolutions have immediate effects. Sometimes they don't. So I don't feel frustrated by that. In so far as I am getting very, very strong support, also public statements by many, many countries at the highest level that they really are standing behind the IEA. Thank you. Yes, sir. Hi. Hello. Thank you for the question. I think what you're raising is very important. But I would separate very clearly the two things. Very clearly. I think one thing is an operational incident that may happen. And when you look at the, we have the nuclear safety world map in front of us here, this house. And we are following the operation of facilities all over the world. And it is not extraordinary to have situations where there can be a leak, quite minor, as it was the case, or a staff might be hurt. We're talking about, don't forget, we're talking about 450 reactors all over the world and hundreds and hundreds of facilities with thousands, tens of thousands of staff working at those, all right? So of course, everything is important. And every single thing that happens, we are trying to follow up accordingly. This is why when we got news that there had been a splash and two employees had been sprinkled with some drops of water that could contain radio nucleates. We put the question. We got the answer that there had been no contamination on this staff, luckily. And then there was some water on the ground. This happens in many, many places. I'm not banalizing this, all right? We are following these things, but they have their specificity and they are not extraordinary events. On the other thing, which is a vast operation, which is being conducted in a planned, programmed way, it is completely different. And as you rightly say, we said and my proposal and my commitment with the international community is to be there before, during and after. I always said that and this is exactly what we did from the very beginning. From the moment Japan announced they wanted to do this. And we supported this, not only with words, but with a concrete presence there and very important, very, very important independent sampling, all right? I want to explain this. In normal circumstances, and this would be accepted because it's part of the normal procedure, the IEA should be corroborating the sampling made by the Japanese operator. This is the normal way. This is what happens in the United States, in Canada, in China, in my country, Argentina. So when we have to do something, we have some exercise or some peer review. Then we check what they do and we say, yes, this is okay. This is according to the here because I felt that it was an extraordinary situation. I proposed to the Japanese that they allow us to do our testing. So no Japanese testing, IAEA testing, IAEA evaluation, IAEA results and they agreed. So I want to make this very, very clear because I know it's important in China. There is a lot of concern and I respect that as I have been discussing with your government and I hope to be discussing that in Beijing when I come later in the year. And by the way, talking about being places, I will be in Japan very soon. And this is one of the things that we are going to be discussing because I agree with you or in the assumption in your question that we need to strengthen. We have a lab there. We have office space. You know, we need to prepare ourselves for the long haul. Yes. Can I ask you two or three questions? First is what the statements from the Iranian very top high officials in Iran. First, the head of Iran's international energy organization saying that we have the capability to build bombs. Yeah, nuclear bomb. Yeah. And then a few weeks later, we had the former head of the agency and the former foreign minister saying that we have all the bits and pieces for building a bomb. You are talking about loose talks, loose talks in Iran, but this is surely more than that. This is a message that we have, as Mr. Saleh said, we have crossed the thresholds, the technical and scientific thresholds, nuclear thresholds. How concerned are you about this beyond this issue of loose talk? There must be something more to it, surely. The other is that you were hoping to visit Iran. I don't know before this session of Board of Governors. I don't know what happened, why you didn't go there. And lastly, you have said before that you are very deeply concerned about the expansion of Iran's nuclear program and its move towards weaponization, nuclear weapon. What would you like the Board of Governors to do ideally? Well, thank you very much. Well, the statements again, I think in this case we have to take what has been said very, very seriously, especially what comes from officials of the government. Dr. Saleh, with whom I have been working for many, many years, is a former foreign minister and a former head of the EOI. But the head of the EOI says very similar things. So as you know, from a purely legal perspective, I have to be able to confirm what we call the completeness and correctness of Iran's declaration. What does it mean? What is hidden behind these legalese words? Completeness is they are saying everything that they should be saying. Correctness is that all that they are saying is right. So the declarations of a country in good standing with the NPT do not include elements, parts or things that you would need to have a nuclear weapon, obviously. So when I hear these things, I wonder, well, is it anything else perhaps that you should be declaring to us, to the agency? We take these things very seriously. I think in the past, all of us as an international community paid a very, very high price when countries were pretending to be formally in good standing with their obligations, where at the same time they were violating them. So I think it is very important that we take our obligations very seriously and we act in accordance with that. That's all there is. So I have to react and I have to say this is not correct. We shouldn't be saying these things. And if you are saying these things, perhaps there are things that you should declare more than you have. So this, of course, will be, this conversation will have to be continued. This is why I always say the only way forward is to talk to each other, not through the press, not through the, through, I don't know, rumors or gossip or whatever. I think we need to establish a good dialogue. I thought we had one when I went to Iran last year and we had a joint statement which was covering very clear areas. Unfortunately, Iran decided to stop implementing it. They started implementing it and then they stopped implementing it. And I'm not saying anything which is a secret. They have said it publicly why they have stopped this. They have said that until they get, you know, sanctions relief or whatever it is. And I have said to that, I signed something in good faith. This is between the agency and the Islamic Republic. This is not between me, the Islamic Republic and country A, B, C or whatever. So I hope we'll be able to be talking to each other again. This is in direct relation with your second part of the question regarding the visit. I hope we will have, I will have an opportunity to talk to them in person as soon as possible. I cannot go if they don't invite me. Whenever they feel that they are ready to talk to me, I will be more than happy to return. Finally, I think your third question was, I never said that I was concerned about weaponization. I don't have any proof or indication that Iran is weaponizing. Well, that's different. That's a different thing. This is why I don't, I don't, I don't engage in loose talk myself or try to at least. So I want to be very precise, very precise. I don't have any information that Iran is making a nuclear weapon, but I hear what they say and I ask questions. And secondly, what I would say is Iran is the only country that does not have a nuclear weapon that isn't reaching at 60%. And it's accumulating uranium and reached at 60%. It's a very high. They have the right. They always say that under the NPT, they have the right to, okay, that is correct. At the same time, they need to have an inspection system which is commensurate with their ambitious program and the levels they are getting on it. Thank you. Thank you. This is Stephanie Liechtenstein today reporting for the Associated Press. Could you confirm, so you're going to Russia tomorrow? Are you confirming that you are meeting with the president of Russia? And once you are coming back to Vienna, are you hoping that the board this week will still issue a signal about the safety of the plant? Is there anything you're hoping for from the board, for example, in the form of a resolution? And if I may, on Iran today, again, you're telling the board that you have lost continuity of knowledge in relation to the production and inventory of centrifuges and so forth. What exactly is the impact of that loss of knowledge? On the first question, of course, and given the level of the meeting, I would expect Russia to be informing officially about this. It's the idea, but of course, until the Russian government officially confirms this, I shouldn't be doing it myself. But this is the intention. Regarding the possible action, I don't think that I wouldn't be expecting if this is the sense of your question that the board reacts after my trip to Moscow or the Russian Federation in general. As I was saying in the first question that I was responding to our colleague here, this is part of a process. It's part of a process. There are many things happening and we need to keep things stable and we need to get to the end of this without a nuclear accident. So I don't expect any immediate, you know, knee jerk reaction to something I may say or somebody else may be saying. So I don't expect anything. Of course, the board will judge whether they want to do something or not. It's up to member states. In terms of continuity of knowledge, yes, this is a very important point, Stephanie. The thing is, as we were saying, we expect diplomacy to restart at some point. We expect an agreement to be reached so that we can have a better situation when it comes to the Iranian nuclear program. The thing is that to do that, just as it happened back in 2015, 2015, 2016, with all these dates, you remember this agreement was very complex with different dates, different date lines and different obligations. Well, all of that was predicated on the notion that these agencies should be able to tell the participants in the agreement that things were okay, that this was the point of departure. There was such amount of nuclear material, such amount of centrifuges, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Well, 2024 is completely different than 2014. It's almost 10 years, believe it or not. We're not getting any younger, aren't we? So this is the case. So the technology in Iran has evolved. We are talking about 60%. We are talking about new centrifuges. We are talking about new sites, et cetera, et cetera. So this is where I say, hey, if you want me to help you quite clearly to fill the gap and to fill in the blanks with the necessary information, there are certain things that we should be able to be doing. So this is the sense of what I say when I say that there is a continuity of knowledge, there's a loss of knowledge, and I am concerned about my ability, the ability of my inspectors to be able to put the jigsaw puzzle together again. Yes. For the first time. Welcome. Thank you. I have two questions in two aspects. One is about a follow-up about your trip to Japan. So what kind of message would you like to highlight or to convene to Tokyo or to the Japanese government? Another one is that what would you expect to bring back after your visit to Japan? So this is one question. Another one is about the upcoming, the first ever nuclear summit. Yes. And what can we expect from this summit, especially in terms of the joint declaration? Yes. And another one. So what kind of a contribution do you expect from the Chinese delegation? Because I'm aware the Chinese nuclear chief and another CEO is already there in the IAA, the panelists, I think. Okay. Very good. In terms of my trip to Tokyo. Thank you. To a certain extent, you can apply the same logic that I am describing when I talk about what I'm doing in Ukraine and the other parts. My involvement and the involvement of the high level authorities of the countries is indispensable because these are very big issues. And as you know, this matter, whatever happened around Fukushima, shocked the world, Japan, its political system, the future of the energy in that country. Many countries in Asia and the Pacific were concerned. So that is that required at that time and now the involvement of the highest authorities. This is why I've been having this contact and discussion with the prime minister, prime ministers, I would say already, of Japan, foreign ministers and others. So it's not that I'm bringing a message. This is the continuation of a very, very important work. And we were discussing with your Chinese colleague now what other things, you know, it's a long-term operation. It's something that is unprecedented because Japan is seeding national competencies to us to carry out very important work. I know that China has been putting forward ideas. They want to be more involved. We are trying to see how we can accommodate this. We are trying to provide solutions. We are there as an honest nuclear safety authority trying to do the right thing. So I am looking forward to this visit, not only to Tokyo, but to Fukushima. I will also go to Fukushima to see with my own eyes, to see what's going on there, to talk to my staff who is there, to talk to the TEPCO management, to talk to the Japanese regulator, to talk to the people. You know, there are many people there that also have concerns. And every time I go there, I meet with journalists, local journalists. I meet with the Chamber of Commerce. I meet with students. And I'm planning to do that because they asked me to do that. I meet with mayors of the different towns and villages around so that they can hear from me. I'm not Japanese. I am the authority, the nuclear regulator of the world, if you want, of sorts. So what we are doing, this is what they need, an explanation, an honest explanation of what is being done and to listen to them. This is very important. So the summit, the summit is very important. The summit indicates how big the change is when it comes to the global discussion on nuclear energy. Now, every country in the world participating, for example, in the conferences of the climate change, the so-called COPS. Now, they all agreed in what I believe is a sea change from the past. It took 28 of these conferences to come to the conclusion that you have to accelerate nuclear. We always believe so. So we are happy that 28 conferences later, there is an agreement, everybody, that nuclear should be accelerated together with renewables and every CO2-free low-carbon source of energy. So the fact that you have, for the first time in history, a summit of heads of state and government on nuclear energy is not to applaud this, obviously, is to get together and to see what can be done to accelerate, to carry out this acceleration. It's not an easy thing. You need the financing mechanisms, for example, which are not easy. China is a powerful country. It can finance, but many other countries have problems and they still need more nuclear and want more nuclear. So what are the international cooperation mechanisms that we can agree at that level of heads of state and government so that this is accelerated? So we have very high expectations of this summit, and I hope to see you and others there. So we'll tell you more when it happens. It is on the 21st of March in Brussels. Then you spoke about China and its cooperation. Of course, China, this year we are celebrating 40 years, 40 years of China's membership in the IEA. And when you look back in history and you see what China was 40 years ago in nuclear, in civilian nuclear, and what is now, it is an amazing story. So I hope to be there and enlarge and strengthen this cooperation, which is indispensable for the success of nuclear energy as a solution to the global warming and many other problems. So I thank you very much for your interest, and we will be seeing each other soon. Thank you. Have a nice day.