EU Statement at the IAEA Board of Governors on Naval Nuclear Propulsion: Brazil, 19 November 2025

Chair,

I have the honour to speak on behalf of the European Union. Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Norway, Republic of Moldova, and Ukraine align themselves with this statement.

The EU would like to thank the Director General for his report.

The EU takes note of the Agency’s continued engagement with Brazil and the Brazilian-Argentine Agency for Accounting and Control of Nuclear Materials in technical discussions on an arrangement under Special Procedures, pursuant to Article 13 of the Quadripartite Safeguards Agreement.

The EU welcomes that Brazil has continued to provide the Agency with updated design information for the land-based prototype reactor and access to relevant facilities, thereby paving the way for further verification activities as and when necessary. We note the ongoing discussions on technical aspects of the required arrangement under those Special Procedures, including the creating of a technical working group comprising all parties concerned, and on ways to facilitate possible verification activities in relation to Brazil’s naval nuclear propulsion programme. 

Chair,

The EU strongly supports and has full confidence in the IAEA’s independent verification role under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and the IAEA safeguards system. We continue to call for the universalisation of the Comprehensive Safeguards Agreements together with the Additional Protocol, as the current verification standard and encourage all parties to support this objective by bringing into force these important instruments.

The EU looks forward to the IAEA Board taking appropriate action once the arrangement is finalised. In the meantime, we encourage the fullest possible transparency and reporting from the IAEA Director General, as appropriate. 

Thank you, Chair.