Iran Accuses IAEA of Weaponising Nuclear Oversight After Strikes
Tehran accuses the IAEA of using damage from US-Israeli strikes to pressure Iran, while warning that normalising attacks on safeguarded nuclear sites risks crippling the non-proliferation regime.
Iran has launched a forceful diplomatic offensive against the IAEA, accusing it of becoming a political instrument of the West. Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi rejected the agency's latest report, saying it deliberately ignores the US and Israeli military strikes that damaged safeguarded nuclear sites. "One cannot ignore the source of the disruption and then frame the consequences against Iran," he wrote. He noted that Director-General Rafael Grossi had never condemned the attacks, which Tehran claims occurred in 17 waves, severely hampering inspectors' access.
The critique was amplified at a special IAEA Board of Governors meeting, where the Iranian delegation called the strikes the most extensive against safeguarded facilities in the agency's history and warned that normalising such attacks threatens the non-proliferation regime. Invoking the board's 1981 condemnation of Israel's attack on Iraq's Osirak reactor, Tehran insisted that international law unequivocally prohibits military action against peacefully-used nuclear sites. Failure to respond, it argued, would set a dangerous precedent.
Viewed from Tehran, the sequence is perverse: attacks disrupted monitoring, and now the IAEA cites the resulting gaps as proliferation concerns, demanding Iran cooperate. Gharibabadi charged that Grossi had shown himself "entirely in the service of Washington and the West," underscoring the deep erosion of trust. Western officials, however, maintain that Iran's safeguards obligations are separate and that its failure to provide timely access remains the core issue. This gulf in interpretation has stalled any diplomatic progress.
The dispute unfolds as the nuclear deal remains frozen and Iran's stockpile of highly enriched uranium grows. Tehran's attempt to reframe the issue around the consequences of attacks is seen by some analysts as a bid to shift international pressure onto Israel and the US. But with no substantive board action expected, the verification crisis deepens, leaving the door open to further escalation.
How the same story is told elsewhere.
The IAEA report ignores the root cause: military strikes by the United States and Israel on safeguarded facilities. The director general, in thrall to the West, has never condemned the attacks, instead exploiting their aftermath to manufacture ambiguity about Iran's nuclear programme. Tehran warns that normalising such strikes endangers the entire non-proliferation regime.
Western diplomatic sources accuse Iran of exploiting the military strikes as a pretext to evade inspections and justify uranium enrichment. The Board of Governors remains focused on unexplained stockpiles and denied access, viewing Tehran's rhetoric as a diversion. Impatience is growing with Iran's victimhood strategy.
Jerusalem views Iran's nuclear programme as an existential threat, and the targeted strikes as legitimate self-defence. The complaint to the IAEA is hypocrisy, after years of concealment and violations. Israel will continue to act to prevent a nuclear Iran, regardless of diplomatic theatre.
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