The Role of the Nuclear Watchdog: A Responsibility for Monitoring Nuclear Safeguards

Safeguards are a set of activities by which the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) verifies a State is living up to its international undertakings not to use nuclear programs for nuclear weapons purposes. IAEA verification helps to provide assurance that nuclear material is not diverted or misused in order to assemble nuclear weapons and that no items required to be declared under safeguards are undeclared. The safeguards system comprises an extensive set of technical measures.  Environmental Sampling (ES) is one of the most a powerful verification techniques used by safeguards inspectors IAEA and the European Safeguards Office (ESO) for the detection of undeclared nuclear activities. Environmental samples are analyzed to detect (unavoidable) traces in the environment originating from technological activities. ES has been routinely applied for about 15 years and is recognised as a sensitive and reliable tool for the verification of the absence of undeclared nuclear activities. Effective IAEA safeguards remain the cornerstone of the world’s nuclear non-proliferation regime aimed at stemming the spread of nuclear weapons and moving towards nuclear disarmament.