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A4| Wednesday, January 11, 2017 HK JPKOML SI IN UKFR MNPR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.

WORLD NEWS

with explosives, which they de-

fused, Mr. Mohammad said.

The Taliban claimed re-

sponsibility for the attack in a

text message, saying the as-

sailant fled the area after the

assault. Local authorities said

it was a suicide attack.

Afghan President Ashraf

Ghani’s special representative

for security in Helmand, Abdul

Jabar Qahraman, said the in-

telligence agency squad had

been formed last year to strike

Taliban-controlled areas.

“This is guerrilla war and

the creation of such force is a

necessity,” Mr. Qahraman said.

“We have to go after the Tali-

ban inside their strongholds.”

Helmand province in the

southwest of the country is a

major center of narcotics pro-

duction and trade, making it

an important source of income

for the militants.

Last year, the Taliban nearly

overran Lashkar Gah but were

pushed back by U.S. and Afghan

troops. The city remains under

siege, with most major roads

leading to and from the city

controlled by the militants.

—Jessica Donati in Kabul

and Asa Fitch in Dubai

contributed to this article.

ployee of a private firm who

was near the scene.

“It was horrifying,” he said.

“I have never seen so many

dead bodies in my life. Many

innocent people died. It was

like a bloodbath.”

The attack is the deadliest

in Kabul since Islamic State

claimed responsibility for a

November bombing that killed

30 Shiite Muslim worshipers

at a popular shrine.

The Taliban and the coun-

try’s Islamic State affiliate

regularly staged attacks in the

city throughout the past year,

targeting government workers

and buildings, foreigners and

members of Afghanistan’s Shi-

ite Hazara minority.

The third attack took place

earlier Tuesday. The Taliban

bombed a meeting of an elite

Afghan intelligence agency

squad in the capital of Hel-

mand province, killing at least

three people and wounding

seven others, said Payenda

Mohammad, a local police offi-

cial. The casualties included

members of the squad, he said.

Following the bombing in the

province’s capital Lashkar Gah,

intelligence officers also found a

truck in the area that was loaded

eign Affairs said its ambassador

to Afghanistan and a number of

Emirati diplomats had been

wounded in the attack. It didn’t

say whether any had been killed.

“The U.A.E. ambassador’s

visit to Kandahar was on [a]

humanitarian mission within

the program of the U.A.E. to

support the brotherly Afghan

people,” the ministry said.

In Kabul, twin blasts killed

at least 32 people and wounded

at least 70 others near Parlia-

ment during the afternoon

rush hour, at an office building

used by members of Parlia-

ment, officials said. In the first

explosion, a suicide bomber

detonated an explosives vest

next to a minibus transporting

government employees, they

said. As rescue crews reached

the scene, a car bomb went off.

The Taliban, Afghanistan’s

largest insurgency, claimed re-

sponsibility for the assault,

which interrupted weeks of rel-

ative calm in the capital amid

frigid winter temperatures.

The explosions shattered

the windows of nearby build-

ings. Casualties were trans-

ferred to hospitals by ambu-

lances and private vehicles,

said Mohammad Asil, an em-

KABUL—Attacks in three

major Afghan cities high-

lighted the worsening security

situation in the country, as

blasts killed more than 45

people on Tuesday and

wounded close to 100 others,

including members of a dele-

gation led by the ambassador

of the United Arab Emirates.

Kandahar’s provincial gov-

ernor, Humayun Azizihad, had

been meeting with the U.A.E.

ambassador to Afghanistan,

Jumaa al Kaabi, at the time of

the explosion, and both sur-

vived with injuries, Afghan of-

ficials said.

The provincial health depart-

ment in Kandahar said the ex-

plosion killed 11 people, includ-

ing a number of Emirati

diplomats and high-ranking Af-

ghan officials at the meeting. At

least 14 others were wounded.

“The corpses are difficult to

identify,” a provincial health

official said, adding that the

building had caught fire, burn-

ing victims inside.

There was no immediate

claim of responsibility.

The U.A.E. Ministry of For-

BYHABIBKHANTOTAKHIL

ANDEHSANULLAHAMIRI

Dozens Die in Attacks on Afghan Cities

ied in the nuclear deal.

At the same time, Mr. Rou-

hani maintains strong political

bonds with pragmatic allies

throughout the political sys-

tem, and enjoys considerable

popular support.

The crowds on Tuesday

looked on as Mr. Rafsanjani’s

casket, topped with the late

leader’s tightly wrapped white

cleric’s turban, was driven

through the streets of Tehran.

The turnout was a strong

show of support for the causes

he fought for, according to his

moderate allies.

Top Iranian officials and al-

lies of Mr. Rafsanjani attended a

prayer ceremony at Tehran Uni-

versity before his body was

moved to be interred alongside

other prominent revolutionaries

in the mausoleum of the Islamic

Republic’s founding figure, Aya-

tollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Hard-liners have given no

indication as to how they may

position themselves to take

advantage of Mr. Rafsanjani’s

absence.

They have many tools at

their disposal, including the

exclusion of candidates for of-

fice through the Guardian

Council, a body that oversees

elections. It is unclear how the

council will approach the com-

ing polls, but it has disquali-

fied prominent people before,

including Mr. Rafsanjani when

he tried to run for president

again in 2013.

“Rouhani has become a

lonely politician who has to

fight on many strong fronts

and has no support,” said Me-

hdi Khalaji, a fellow at the

Washington Institute for Near

East Policy. “Now he has to

prove whether he was a suc-

cessful president in creating

enough of a social power base

for himself to get re-elected.”

At the same time, potential

candidates among the hard-

liners don’t have the mass ap-

peal of Mr. Rouhani, moderate

parliament member Behrouz

Nemati said.

Mr. Nemati pointed to the

turnout for Mr. Rafsanjani’s fu-

neral procession as a sign that

many Iranians share his vision.

“Today, it was obvious that peo-

ple from different backgrounds

were united together and had

the same voice,” he said.

Mr. Rouhani, who wasn’t a

central figure in the 1979 revo-

lution, won the presidency in

2013 with help from Mr. Raf-

sanjani. The newly elected

leader went on to promote

greater economic openness and

to oppose hard-line social prior-

ities, which include restricting

public expression and confining

women to traditional roles.

He also sought to mend

Iran’s relations with the West,

opposing those who view in-

teraction with foreigners as a

threat to the country’s Islamic

ruling system.

A political rebound by hard-

liners could upend the prag-

matic foreign policy that Mr.

Rafsanjani favored and inject

new doubt into Iran’s compli-

ance with the nuclear deal

reached with six world powers,

which Mr. Rouhani backed.

Soheila Jelodarzadeh, a mod-

erate member of Parliament,

said like-minded politicians

would strive to build on Mr.

Rafsanjani’s legacy of tolerance

and openness even if his death

made the task more difficult.

Tens of thousands of Irani-
ans filled the streets of Tehran
on Tuesday for the funeral
procession of former President
Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, as
moderates grappled with how
his death will affect a longtime
ally’s chances of winning re-
election as president in May.
The only declared candidate

backed by conservatives has a
low public profile and there
are no official opinion polls to
gauge popularity in Iran’s
opaque electoral system. But
Mr. Rafsanjani’s death deprived
President Hassan Rouhani, who
backed the 2015 nuclear deal
and favors improving ties with
the West, of his most powerful
supporter.
“There is a feeling of con-
cern, and it definitely has an
impact on the reformists and
moderates,” said Mohammad
Javad Haghshenas, a univer-
sity professor and member of
the central council of the Na-
tional Confidence Party, which
supports Mr. Rouhani.
Hard-liners are less worried
about the moderates’ political
sway and how to counter it in
the wake of Mr. Rafsanjani’s
death, Mr. Haghshenas said.
“The government [of Mr. Rou-
hani] is definitely now in a dif-
ficult position,” he said.
As a central figure in the 1979
Islamic Revolution, Mr. Rafsan-
jani offered a unique well of
support for moderates because
hard-liners within the clerical
establishment couldn’t question
his revolutionary credentials.
That gave Mr. Rafsanjani
cover to back causes sup-
ported by moderates, such as
allowing greater freedom of
expression and pursuing closer
ties with the West as embod-

By Aresu Eqbali

in Tehran and

Asa Fitch in Dubai

Iran Leader Faces Test After Ally’s Death

Moderates fear the

impact on Rouhani’s

re-election bid and his

efforts at overhauls

Iranians gathered around a hearse carrying the coffin of former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani during his funeral ceremony in the capital Tehranon Tuesday.

ATTA KENARE/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES

Afghan police officers stood guard near the site of a suicide attack in Kabul on Tuesday, one of a series of strikes around the country.

OMAR SOBHANI/REUTERS

enriched uranium allowed in

the country. When highly en-

riched, uranium can be used to

fuel a nuclear weapon.

The Wall Street Journal re-

ported in November that the

U.S. and its partners were dis-

cussing with Iran steps that

could be taken to reduce its

enriched-uranium stockpile at

its mothballed uranium facility

in Isfahan in central Iran.

According to people in-

volved in Tuesday’s discus-

sions, Iran has agreed to a

plan that would see the facil-

ity cleaned out and enriched

uranium taken out and de-

graded. When the nuclear deal

was agreed to in 2015, Iran

had an estimated 100 kilo-

grams of enriched uranium

stuck in the pipes and machin-

ery at the plant.

Officials say there are vari-

ous ways the facility could be

cleaned out including, for ex-

ample, flushing the pipes with

chemicals to create a liquid

waste that would be very hard

to turn back into powder form

for enriching into weapons-

grade uranium.

While diplomats said Iran

provided no timeline for the

action, if they flushed out all

the enriched uranium, their

stockpile of the material

would likely fall under 200 ki-

lograms, eliminating any

near-term risk of Iran over-

stepping the limit. The precise

amount of enriched uranium

still at Isfahan is currently a

matter of dispute between

Iran and the IAEA.

Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minis-

ter Abbas Araghchi confirmed

that Iran plans to clean out the

enrichment facility and said

that as a result, “Iran will be

able to enrich more material,”

according to Iran’s official Is-

lamic Republic News Agency.

However, there will again be

questions about Tuesday’s

agreement. While U.S. officials

insist that only uranium that is

“unrecoverable” as nuclear

fuel can be exempted, some

nuclear experts have raised

doubts about the decisions.

At the heart of their con-

cerns is the fact that neither

the IAEA nor the six powers

have spelled out exactly what

they classify as unrecover-

able material.

BRUSSELS—Iran agreed to
take steps that would push its
stockpile of enriched uranium
far below the 300-kilogram
cap fixed in its 2015 nuclear
agreement, potentially elimi-
nating one flashpoint over an
accord that President-elect
Donald Trump repeatedly criti-
cized during his election cam-
paign, Western diplomats said.
The pledge by Tehran to
take the step came after dis-
cussions in Vienna on Tuesday
with the six powers that nego-
tiated the nuclear accord. The
meeting is expected to be the
last the Obama administration
will take part in before Mr.
Trump takes office on Jan. 20.
While the agreement could
remove one potential flash-
point over the accord, mod-
estly lengthening the period
before Iran could build a nu-
clear weapon, plenty of oth-
ers exist.
The outgoing administra-

tion has been looking for ways
to bolster the accord, a key
part of the president’s foreign
policy legacy, ahead of Mr.
Trump’s inauguration. Mr.
Trump’s plans for the deal are
uncertain. He attacked the deal
repeatedly during the presi-
dential campaign and has ap-
pointed critics to top positions
in his administration.
U.S. and European officials
have been discussing for
months steps Iran could take
to ensure it steers clear of key
thresholds in the accord.
In November, the Interna-
tional Atomic Energy Agency
voiced concerns about Iran ex-
ceeding for a second time the
130-metric-ton cap for heavy
water, a material that can be
used to produce plutonium.
Western officials have also
said Iran has come very close
in recent weeks to its 300-kilo-
gram ceiling on the amount of

BYLAURENCENORMAN

Tehran Agrees to Slash

Its Uranium Stockpile

Move may eliminate

one flashpoint over

the deal, but others

remain.

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