Views on the nuclear program of Iran

See also: United Nations Security Council Resolution 1747 and Non-aligned movement § Current activities and positions

Views on the nuclear program of Iran vary greatly, as the nuclear program of Iran is a very contentious geopolitical issue.

The Iranian viewpoint

In taking a stance that the Shah of Iran expressed decades ago, Iranians feel its valuable Petroleum should be used for high-value products, not simple electricity generation. "Petroleum is a noble material, much too valuable to burn ... We envision producing, as soon as possible, 23,000 megawatts of electricity using nuclear plants," the Shah had previously said. Assuming pumping rates remain steady, Iran has only enough oil to last another 75 years. Iran also faces financial constraints, and claims that developing the excess capacity in its oil industry would cost it $40 billion, let alone pay for the power plants. Roger Stern from Johns Hopkins University partially concurred with this view, projecting that due to "energy subsidies, hostility to foreign investment and inefficiencies of its [Iranian] state-planned economy", Iranian oil exports would vanish by 2014–2015, although he notes that this outcome has "no relation to 'peak oil.'" Earlier, the Gerald Ford Administration had arrived at a similar assessment, and independent studies conducted by the Foreign Affairs Select Committee of the British Parliament and the U.S. National Academy of Sciences previously confirmed that Iran has a valid economic basis for its nuclear energy program.

The Iranians believe that concerns about nuclear weapons proliferation are pretextual, and any suspension of enrichment is simply intended to ultimately deprive Iran of the right to have an independent nuclear technology:

[W]e had a suspension for two years and on and off negotiations for three ... Accusing Iran of having "the intention" of acquiring nuclear weapons has, since the early 1980s, been a tool used to deprive Iran of any nuclear technology, even a light water reactor or fuel for the American-built research reactor ... the United States and EU3 never even took the trouble of studying various Iranian proposals: they were – from the very beginning – bent on abusing this Council and the threat of referral and sanctions as an instrument of pressure to compel Iran to abandon the exercise of its NPT guaranteed right to peaceful nuclear technology ..

Iran says that its inalienable right to peaceful nuclear technology has been the subject of "the most extensive and intensive campaign of denial, obstruction, intervention and misinformation" and that the international community has been subject to "bias, politicized and exaggerated information" on the Iranian nuclear program and activities.

After the 1979 Iranian Revolution, Iran informed the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of its plans to restart its nuclear program using indigenously made nuclear fuel, and in 1983 the IAEA planned to provide assistance in uranium conversion (not enrichment) to Iran under its Technical Assistance Program, until the program was terminated under US pressure. An IAEA report at the time stated clearly that its aim was to "contribute to the formation of local expertise and manpower needed to sustain an ambitious program in the field of nuclear power reactor technology and fuel cycle technology." Iran's enrichment program was openly discussed on national radio in the early 1980s, and IAEA inspectors were even invited to visit Iran's uranium mines in 1992.

Iran announced plans in 1995 to build a uranium hexafluoride (UF6) conversion plant at the Nuclear Technical Centre in Esfahan, with Chinese assistance. During a November 1996 IAEA visit to Isfahan, Iran, informed the IAEA Department of Safeguards that it planned to build a uranium hexafluoride (UF6) conversion plant at the Nuclear Technology Center. The UF6 plant was scheduled to open after 2000, but the project was abandoned by China under pressure from the United States in October 1997. The Iranians informed the IAEA that they would complete the project nonetheless. In 2000, the Iranians completed the uranium conversion project, using the blueprints provided to them by China, and declared the facility to the IAEA. The facility was planned with the intention of supplying UO2 (Uranium dioxide) as fuel to the 40 MW Heavy Water Reactor under construction at Arak and to meet the needs of UF6 (Uranium hexafluoride) for the Natanz enrichment facility.

Iran argues that it disclosed information about its programs in which "in nearly all cases, it was not any way obliged to disclose in accordance with its obligations under its safeguards agreement with the IAEA." Iran says its voluntary confidence building measures were only "reciprocated by broken promises and expanded requests" and that the EU3 "simply wanted prolonged and fruitless negotiations" to inhibit Iran from exercising its inalienable right to peaceful nuclear technology.

Iran says it has suggested to the EU3 to ask the IAEA to develop monitoring modalities for Iran's enrichment program as objective guarantees to ensure that Iran's nuclear program will remain exclusively for peaceful purposes and has also provided its own set of Western suggested modalities to the Agency.

However, Iran says it will not suspend its enrichment because "it would further be deprived from its inalienable right to work on nuclear fuel cycle, with the aim of producing required fuels for its research reactors and nuclear power plants."

Dr. William O. Beeman, Brown University's Middle East Studies program professor, who spent years in Iran, says that the Iranian nuclear issue is a unified point of their political discussion:

"The Iranian side of the discourse is that they want to be known and seen as a modern, developing state with a modern, developing industrial base. The history of relations between Iran and the West for the last hundred years has included Iran's developing various kinds of industrial and technological advances to prove to themselves—and to attempt to prove to the world—that they are, in fact, that kind of country."

Stephen McGlinchey agrees, noting that the Islamic Republic of Iran "owes its existence to its identity as a reaction to the Western way of life and of doing business. To come to a conciliation with the international community, spearheaded by the American insistence that Iran must not ever have full mastery of the nuclear cycle is in essence dismantling the foundations and the pride of the Regime."

Iran also believes it has a legal right to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, a right which in 2005 the U.S. and the EU-3 began to assert had been forfeited by a clandestine nuclear program that came to light in 2002.

Iranian politicians compare its treatment as a signatory to the NPT with three nuclear-armed nations that have not signed the NPT: Israel, India, and Pakistan. Each of these nations developed an indigenous nuclear weapons capability: Israel by 1966, India by 1974, and Pakistan by 1990.

The Iranian authorities assert that they cannot simply trust the United States or Europe to provide Iran with nuclear energy fuel, and point to a long series of agreements, contracts and treaty obligations which were not fulfilled. Developing nations say they do not want to give up their rights to uranium enrichment and do not trust the United States or other nuclear countries to be consistent suppliers of the nuclear material they would need to run their power plants.

Determination to continue the nuclear program and retaliate against any Western attack is strong in Iran. Hassan Abbasi, director of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps think tank, Doctrinal Analysis Center for Security without Borders (Markaz-e barresiha-ye doktrinyal-e amniyat bedun marz,) has announced that "approximately 40,000 Iranian estesh-hadiyun (martyrdom-seekers)" are ready to carry out suicide operations against "twenty-nine identified Western targets," should the U.S. military hit Iranian nuclear installations.

Some have argued that there is a double standard between the treatment of Iran, which was reported to the Security Council for undeclared enrichment and reprocessing activities, and South Korea, which had failed to report enrichment and reprocessing experiments but was not found in non-compliance. In South Korea's case, issues were reported by the IAEA Secretariat but the IAEA Board of Governors did not make a formal finding of non-compliance. In making its decision, the Board said "there is no indication that the undeclared experiments have continued" and observed that the "Republic of Korea has an Additional Protocol in force and that developments in the Republic of Korea demonstrate the utility of the Additional Protocol." Pierre Goldschmidt, former head of the department of safeguards at the IAEA, has called on the Board of Governors to adopt generic resolutions which would apply to all states in such circumstances and has argued "political considerations played a dominant role in the board's decision" to not make a formal finding of non-compliance.

Despite its history with the West, Iran has said it would like to see a warming in relations. Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the chairman of the Expediency Council and the Assembly of Experts, has said that Iran is not seeking enmity with the U.S. and that Iran would respond to any "formal" message which contained "change in practice". Seyed Mohammad Marandi, a professor at Tehran University, has suggested that if the United States is serious about negotiating with Iran in the future then "that the United States must take concrete steps toward decreasing tension with Iran" such as reassessing Iranian sanctions, reassessing Iranian assets frozen in the United States since the Iranian revolution, and reassessing Washington's backing of Israel. Professor Hamidreza Jalaiepour, a political sociology teacher in Tehran, said if the U.S. examined these options, Iran would be likely to immediately respond in a variety of ways, including helping stabilize Afghanistan, for example.

Middle Eastern views

The New York Times reported in 2007 that Iran's nuclear program had spurred interest in establishing nuclear power programs by a number of neighboring countries, including Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt. Many countries outside the Mideast nations are also interested in nuclear power. According to the report, "roughly a dozen states in the region have recently turned to the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna for help in starting" nuclear programs. The article also described neighbouring states as very hostile to any nuclear weapons program Iran might embark on, stating "many diplomats and analysts say that the Sunni Arab governments are so anxious about Iran's nuclear progress that they would even, grudgingly, support a United States military strike against Iran." However, some Arab countries have nuclear programs that are as old as Iran's, and their interest in nuclear power corresponds to a worldwide nuclear renaissance which applies also to Arab states that are seeking to conserve hydrocarbon resources, reduce carbon emissions, and provide electricity and safe drinking water for their rapidly growing populations.

Like Iran, Egypt refuses to implement the Additional Protocol, although Iran has signed it and implemented it for two years until it was reported for safeguards non-compliance. Egypt links its position to Israel's refusal to accept IAEA safeguards and calls the Protocol "a voluntary thing." On 17 May 2009, Arab League Chief Amr Moussa said that Israel's nuclear program was more worrying than Iran's. This followed a statement in March that the member states of the Arab League would abandon the NPT if Israel ever made its possession of nuclear weapons official.

Recently the governments of a number of Arab countries have been using economic means to persuade Russia and China to support sanctions against Iran's controversial program.

Diplomatic cables leaked in 2010 revealed that Muslim countries such as Saudi Arabia and Bahrain supported a military attack against Iran aimed to stop the Iranian nuclear program.

Israeli views

See also: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Israel, Nuclear weapons and Israel, and Potential military strike on Iran

Some Israeli officials publicly characterize Iran's nuclear program as an "existential threat" to Israel, and Israeli leaders assert that all options are kept open in dealing with Tehran. The threat has been compared to the threat the Jews of Europe faced prior to the Holocaust. However, some Israeli officials have privately and publicly rejected such a characterization of Iran's program. According to The Economist, "most of those Israeli experts willing to talk rate the chances of an Iranian nuclear attack as low. Despite Mr Ahmadinejad, most consider Iran to be a rational state actor susceptible to deterrence."

Israel, which is not a party to the NPT and is widely believed to possess the Middle East's only nuclear arsenal does not believe the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate conclusion that Iran had stopped its nuclear weapons program in 2003, insisting that it has additional evidence of an active and continued Iranian nuclear weapons program. Israel has also rejected the IAEA's November 2007 and February 2008 reports on Iran, and Israeli officials have called for the resignation of IAEA Director General ElBaradei, accusing him of being "pro-Iranian." Senior Israeli, French British, German and American officials have reportedly pressured the IAEA to release allegedly censored evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program. IAEA spokesman Marc Vidricaire, though, issued a brief statement on the matter, characterizing the allegations against ElBaradei as "misinformation or misinterpretation" which have "no basis in fact."

In early June 2008, Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz expressed frustration with the perceived ineffectiveness of sanctions aimed at discouraging Iran from uranium enrichment. Israel believes the enrichment may be used to aid an alleged nuclear weapons program. Mofaz said that the United Nations Security Council and the international community have "a duty and responsibility to clarify to Iran, through drastic measures, that the repercussions of their continued pursuit of nuclear weapons will be devastating." In the same interview, Mofaz also made more direct threats to Iran's nuclear facilities, saying "if Iran continues with its programme for developing nuclear weapons, we will attack it." Iranian spokesman Gholam Hoseyn Elham has dismissed Israeli attacks on its nuclear facilities as "impossible". "The Israeli regime has been emboldened due to carelessness and silence of the Security Council," the Iranians further said in a response letter to the United Nations. These statements came only days after Prime Minister Ehud Olmert asked for stronger sanctions, saying that "the long-term cost of a nuclear Iran greatly outweighs the short-term benefits of doing business with Iran."

Israeli officials were reportedly concerned about the Bush administration's decision on 16 July 2008, to send a high-ranking diplomat to attend negotiation sessions between EU representatives and Iran's chief nuclear negotiator in Geneva. Israel sources reportedly obtained assurances from the Bush administration that there would be no compromise on the demand that Iran end uranium enrichment.

The Israelis have also sought to "alert the American intelligence community to Iran's nuclear ability," in preparation for the new NIE, reportedly due in November 2008. In September 2008, Yossi Baidatz, the head of the research division of Israeli military intelligence was quoted to say that Iran was "not likely" to obtain nuclear capabilities by 2010.

Walter Pincus of the Washington Post has written that Israel's stance on nuclear arms complicates efforts against Iran. Gawdat Bahgat of the National Defense University believes Iran's nuclear program is partially formed on the potential threat of a nuclear Israel. Iran and the Arab League have proposed the that the Middle East be established as a Nuclear Weapon Free Zone. Israel said in May 2010 it would not consider taking part in nuclear weapon-free zone discussions or joining the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty until a lasting peace was achieved with its neighbors.

Israel has repeatedly warned that it will strike Iran's nuclear facilities if its nuclear program is not stopped through diplomatic channels. In June 2008, the Israeli Air Force conducted a massive and highly publicized exercise over the Mediterranean Sea, where Israeli aircraft practiced aerial refuelling and simulated attacks on targets 870 miles off the Israeli coast. Israeli Ambassador to the United States Sallai Meridor said that the window for diplomatic action was rapidly closing, and that "Israel will not tolerate a nuclear Iran." In 2010, a joint air exercise between Israel and Greece took place on Crete. Called "Minoas 2010", it was temporarily suspended by Greece in the aftermath of the Gaza flotilla raid, but later resumed. Israel tested five F-16I Sufa and five F-15I fighter jets in strike missions, Sikorsky CH-53 Sea Stallion helicopters in pilot rescue missions, and a Boeing aircraft to practice aerial refuelling. Because Iranian nuclear facilities are heavily fortified and often located underground, Israel Military Industries is developing the MPR-500 bunker buster bomb, and Israeli pilots have allegedly practiced airstrikes involving low-yield nuclear weapons.

In May 2010, Israel reportedly deployed Dolphin class submarines with nuclear missiles capable of reaching any target in Iran in the Persian Gulf. Their reported missions were to deter Iran, gather intelligence, and to potentially land Mossad agents on the Iranian coast. In July, two Israeli missile boats were also deployed.

Some in Israel are worried that Iran may achieve a latent capability to produce nuclear weapons without taking any overt steps that would expose it to further international action.

US and European viewpoint

Main article: Iran and weapons of mass destruction

See also: Potential military strike on Iran

In March 2005, the New York Times reported that a bipartisan Congressional inquiry concluded that the United States had inadequate intelligence to reach any conclusions on the state of Iran's nuclear program. In March 2009, the US Director of National Intelligence and Defense Intelligence Agency Director both testified before Congress that Iran did not have highly enriched uranium for bomb-making and had not made the decision to produce any, and also that Iran's missile program was not related to its nuclear program.

Much of the debate about the 'Iranian nuclear threat' is therefore driven by concern that Iran's mastery of civilian technology could provide it the means to rapidly develop a weapons capability should Iran wish to do so in the future. President Bush claimed that Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons could trigger "World War III", while in 2007 Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns warned Iran may be seeking a nuclear weapons capability. Steven C. Welsh, Managing Editor of FrontPage Magazine, when discussing Iran's nuclear program says that Iran "concealed this program for nearly two decades by lying, dissembling and deceiving UN inspectors". The Economist magazine opined that "even before the election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Iran was negotiating in bad faith. During this period, European officials believe, it continued to work in secret on nuclear research, having promised to suspend uranium enrichment." The Iranians attributed the concealment of portions of their nuclear program to the fact that the US repeatedly hampered their overt attempts at acquiring the necessary technology for their program, and also point out that they promised to suspend enrichment rather than cease all research. After about two years, Iran ceased its voluntary and temporary suspension of enrichment after receiving a "very insulting and humiliating" offer which some analysts described as an "empty box". In response, the West rejected an Iranian offer for a nuclear consortium in Iran and said they would go to the Security Council for sanctions. Iran says its voluntary confidence building measures were only "reciprocated by broken promises and expanded requests" and that the EU3 "simply wanted prolonged and fruitless negotiations" to inhibit Iran from exercising its inalienable right to peaceful nuclear technology.

Western governments say they now accept Iran's desire for nuclear power. For example, in November 2007, President Bush acknowledged Iran's sovereign right to civilian nuclear technology. Independent analyses support the economic basis for an Iranian nuclear power program. A study by the UK Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology concluded in March 2004 that "some of John Bolton's criticisms were not supported by an analysis of the facts (for example, much of the gas flared off by Iran is not recoverable for energy use), but that Iran's decision to adopt the nuclear power option could not entirely be explained by the economics of energy production." An article published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences concluded that "Iran's claim to need nuclear power to preserve exports is genuine."

The P5 (China, France, Russia, United Kingdom, and United States) plus Germany (the P5+1) have offered benefits to Iran, including "legally binding" fuel supply guarantees. The deal offered by the P5+1 would leave Iran reliant on external sources of fuel, as is true for most countries with nuclear power programs though many of them also lack indigenous resources to produce their own fuel, or do not have the same strategic security concerns as Iran. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad rejected this proposal, saying that Iran had the right to process uranium for fuel and that Iran "will not retreat one iota in the face of oppressing powers."

While recognizing Iran's interest in nuclear power, skeptics such as The Economist and ISIS have questioned the rationale for Iran's enrichment program. An op-ed published in January 2008 in The Economist, which said the threat of force had "put some steel" into the diplomatic process, opined that "learning to enrich uranium—a hugely costly venture—still makes questionable economic sense for Iran, since it lacks sufficient natural uranium to keep them going and [they] would have to import the stuff." In February 2012, The Financial Times opined that "Current evidence suggests the Iranians want the ability to make a bomb but have not taken the decision to actually build one." A February 2009 ISIS report argued there was a perceived "fundamental inconsistency" between the stated purposes and available information on the capabilities of Iran's domestic uranium production program. The report, citing data published by Iran and the IAEA on Iran's uranium resources, argued that those resources are sufficient for developing a weapons capability, but would not meet the requirements for even a single power reactor. The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran responded to this and related stories by saying it had sufficient uranium mines. The Foreign Ministry of Iran said Western claims of a uranium shortage were "media speculation without any scientific basis" and that Iran was not seeking uranium on international markets. The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran has said surveys had shown proven reserves of approximately 3,000 tons of uranium so far and that the expected resources of Iran could be at the range of 20,000–30,000 tons. The organization concluded that "according to all the surveys performed in power sector of Iran, nuclear option is the most competitive to fossil alternatives if the existing low domestic fuel prices are gradually increased to its opportunity costs at the level of international prices." In effect, the Bush administration took the position that Iran was too dangerous to be allowed "the technology to produce nuclear material for electricity".

In December 2008, the ISIS asserted that Iran had produced 425 kilograms of uranium, and that Iran had "not yet achieved a break-out capability", but that Iran may be close to a break-out capability. In response to claims that Iran had enough material to make a weapon, the Arms Control Association urged the U.S. and media to exhibit greater care when making claims about Iran's nuclear program. Ivan Oelrich and Ivanka Barzashka, from the Federation of American Scientists, say that the "simplistic calculations" contained in the ISIS article were wrong because "just taking the quantity of LEU and multiplying by the U-235 concentration does not work because not all of the U-235 is recovered". Cheryl Rofer, a retired 35 year researcher at Los Alamos National Laboratory and former president of the Los Alamos Committee on Arms Control and International Security, has argued that for Iran to make a bomb from this material it would need to kick all the inspectors out of the country, reconfigure thousands of closely watched centrifuges, and then engage in years of enrichment. According to the American Institute of Physics, the most difficult step in building a nuclear weapon is the production of fissile material. Iran has enriched uranium to "less than 5%," consistent with fuel for a nuclear power plant and well below the purity of WEU (around 90%) typically used in a weapons program. HEU with a purity of 20% or more is usable in a weapon, but this route is less desirable because far more material is required to obtain critical mass. "Our production of a nuclear energy program is completely within the framework or structure of international laws," said Ali Akbar Javanfekr, media adviser to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. David Albright, president of the group which published the report, maintained that Iran's enriched uranium meant that Israel was losing control over the timing of Iran's nuclear activities and that even Iran pretending to have a bomb would be a threat. The International Atomic Energy Agency said its inspectors have not found evidence to suggest that Iran is attempting to process low-enriched uranium into weapons-grade uranium. "At the moment, I'm not very concerned," said Andreas Persbo, an analyst at the Verification Research, Training and Information Center.

Western sources have expressed mixed views on the logic of Iran's nuclear fuel cycle investments. An op-ed published in The Economist opined that with the money spent on its nuclear program, Iran could have built "ten conventional plants of the same capacity, fired solely by the natural gas that Iran currently flares off into the sky". David Isenberg, a senior analyst with the Washington-based British American Security Information Council (BASIC), has argued oil and gas production has its own costs, that Iran gains strategic value from being an oil and gas exporter, and that "as a sovereign nation Iran is entitled to make its own sovereign decisions as to how provide for its own energy needs".

Christoph Bertram, a former director of the International Institute for Security Studies, has said that a "nuclear Iran" would not be in Iran's strategic interest, and rather that a nuclear Iran would jeopardise the strenuously gained political capital that it has earned since the end of the Iran-Iraq war. Volker Perthes, director of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, argues that "a strategic decision on the final aim of the Iranian nuclear programme has not been made". Perthes suggests a WMD-free zone in the Middle East is the best way to deal with the alleged nuclear ambitions of Iran.

On 31 July 2006, the Security Council passed a resolution demanding that Iran stop "all enrichment-related and reprocessing activities." (Reprocessing involves chemically separating plutonium from other nuclear waste products, a procedure that can lead to production of bomb-grade fuel.) A month later, an IAEA report indicated that "there are no indications of ongoing reprocessing activities in Iran."

The United States failed to get any backing for military attacks on Iran to enforce the sanctions. The March resolution even restated the UN position that the Middle East region should be nuclear free.

U.S. officials told the New York Times that the new sanctions went beyond the nuclear issue. "The new language was written to rein in what they [U.S. officials] see as Tehran's ambitions to become the dominant military power in the Persian Gulf and across the Middle East."

Kouchner was not specific about what penalties Europe might impose, other than to say they could be "economic sanctions regarding financial movements." "Our German friends proposed this. We discussed it a few days ago," he said. "The international community's demand is simple: They must stop enriching uranium," Kouchner said. "Our Iranian friends want to create, they say, civilian nuclear energy. They have the right to that, but all that they are doing proves the contrary. That is why we are worried," he said.

Tensions have been raised by media reports of an Israeli air incursion over northeastern Syria on 6 September. One U.S. official said the attack hit weapons heading for the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, an ally of Syria and Iran, but there also has been speculation the Israelis hit a nascent nuclear facility or were studying routes for a possible future strike on Iran. Others suspect Israel was performing an intelligence operation for the U.S.

With Iran adding to the talk of military options, Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns called in September 2007 for UN Security Council members and U.S. allies to help push for a third round of sanctions against Iran over the nuclear program.

In 2006 the Germans suggested that Iran would be able to operate their enrichment program, subject to IAEA inspections. The German Minister of Defense Franz Josef Jung stated that a ban on Iranian enrichment work was unrealistic, that "One cannot forbid Iran from doing what other countries in the world are doing in accordance with international law" and that IAEA oversight of any Iranian enrichment activities would provide the necessary assurances to the international community that Iran could not secretly divert the program of weapons use. Later, the Europeans reportedly also considered a compromise proposal where Iran would be allowed to continue spinning its centrifuges but would not feed any processed uranium hexafluoride (UF6) into the machines during the course of negotiations.

The Iranians had also indicated that they were willing to consider suspending large-scale enrichment for up to two years, but were not prepared to freeze enrichment entirely

The compromise ideas were reportedly shot down by the US, and Robert Joseph, the Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control reportedly told ElBaradei: "We cannot have a single centrifuge spinning in Iran. Iran is a direct threat to the national security of the United States and our allies, and we will not tolerate it. We want you to give us an understanding that you will not say anything publicly that will undermine us."

In June 2007, IAEA director Mohammad ElBaradei suggested that Iran should be allowed limited uranium enrichment under strict supervision of the IAEA. His remarks were formally criticised by Nicholas Burns, the US Under-Secretary of State, who said: "We are not going to agree to accept limited enrichment"

ElBaradei later criticized the US position and said,

I have seen the Iranians ready to accept putting a cap on their enrichment [program] in terms of tens of centrifuges, and then in terms of hundreds of centrifuges. But nobody even tried to engage them on these offers. Now Iran has 5,000 centrifuges. The line was, "Iran will buckle under pressure." But this issue has become so ingrained in the Iranian soul as a matter of national pride.

In February 2008, Pierre Vimont, the French Ambassador to the United States, urged that the United States adopt a more flexible approach to Iran by accepting its regional role and recognizing that the nuclear issue has broad popular support among Iranians.

The United States has claimed Iran's launching of a data processing satellite could be linked to the development of a military nuclear capability and that the activities were of "great concern". The U.S. specifically said it would continue "to address the threats posed by Iran, including those related to its missile and nuclear programs." Despite the U.S. saying it would use all elements of the national power to deal with Tehran, Iran criticized the West's double standards and said the launch was a step to remove the scientific monopoly certain world countries are trying to impose on the world. Iraqi National Security Advisor Muwafaq al-Rubaie said Iraq was very pleased with the launch of Iran's peaceful data-processing national satellite.

On 26 February 2009, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice said that the United States "will seek to end Iran's ambition to acquire an illicit nuclear capability and its support for terrorism". Robert Wood, spokesman for the U.S. State Department, said that the U.S. believes that "Iran doesn't need to develop its own nuclear capacity" and specifically that the U.S. does not believe that Iran needs to develop an indigenous uranium enrichment capacity. On 8 April 2009, Wood said that "on the basis of mutual respect and mutual interest" the U.S. would sit with the P-5+1 in discussions with Iran and ask the EU High Representative for Common and Foreign Security Policy to extend an invitation to Iran to meet with representatives of the P-5+1. Wood further said, "We hope this will be the occasion to seriously engage Iran on how to break the logjam of recent years and work in a cooperative manner to resolve the outstanding international concerns about its nuclear program". U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said "pursuing very careful engagement on a range of issues that affect our interests and the interests of the world with Iran makes sense".

In March 2009, the Supreme Leader of Iran questioned the sincerity so far of the U.S.'s new rhetoric, and Iran's ambassador to International Atomic Energy Agency said UN sanctions united Iranians to protect their "national interest" of enrichment. In April 2009, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said his country "welcomes a hand extended to it should it really and truly be based on honesty, justice and respect." Karim Sadjadpour, of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, has said Iran's leader "holds strongly that Tehran must not compromise in the face of U.S. pressure or intimidation, for it would project weakness and encourage even greater pressure." Richard Haass, President of the Council on Foreign Relations, has said "the United States should be willing to discuss what Iran (as a signatory of the NPT) describes as its "right to enrich." It may well be necessary to acknowledge this right, provided that Iran accepts both limits on its enrichment program (no HEU) and enhanced safeguards". Mark Fitzpatrick, a Senior Fellow for Non‐Proliferation at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, has said "a key policy challenge is how to build a barrier between a latent nuclear weapons capability and actual weapons production. This is difficult when, as in Iran's case today, the distinction is blurred almost to the point of invisibility." On Tuesday, 27 July 2010 British Prime Minister David Cameron made what has been described as "his most outspoken comments on the Tehran regime since becoming PM", saying "Iran is enriching uranium to 20 per cent with no Industrial logic other than producing a bomb. If Iran's nuclear program is peaceful, then why won't Iran allow the International Atomic Energy Agency to inspect? Why does Iran continue to seek to acquire military components? And why does Iran continue to threaten Israel with annihilation?" These comments were made the day after the European Union introduced sanctions which ban the sale of equipment, technology and services to Iran.

On 1 December 2011 The European Union had agreed to impose sanctions on 180 Iranian officials and companies, EU diplomats say. The sanctions were announced after a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels. The EU has yet to release details about the 180 officials and entities which will be targeted by the sanctions.

2007 Iran National Intelligence Estimate

In December 2007 the United States National Intelligence Estimate (representing the consensus view of all 16 American spy agencies) "judged with high confidence" that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003, with "moderate confidence" that the program remains frozen, and with "moderate-to-high confidence" that Iran is "keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons." The estimate said that the enrichment program could still provide Iran with enough raw material to produce a nuclear weapon sometime by the middle of next decade but that intelligence agencies "do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons" at some future date. Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader of the Senate in 2008, said he hoped the administration would "appropriately adjust its rhetoric and policy". The conclusion that Iran had a nuclear weapons program in 2003 was reportedly mainly based on the contents of a laptop computer that was allegedly stolen from Iran and provided to US intelligence agencies by dissidents. The Russians dismissed this conclusion, stating that they had not seen evidence that Iran had ever pursued a nuclear weapons program.

The 2007 NIE report, contradicted the previous 2005 NIE conclusion which asserted that Iran had an active and on-going nuclear weapons program in 2005. According to a senior administration official, in a January 2008 conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Israeli and other foreign officials asked President Bush to explain the 2007 NIE. Bush "told the Israelis that he can't control what the intelligence community says, but that (the NIE's) conclusions don't reflect his own views". After Bush seemed to distance himself from the report, the White House later said Bush endorses the "full scope" of the US intelligence findings on Iran.

Mohammed ElBaradei, the Director of the IAEA, noted in particular that the NIE's conclusions corresponded with the IAEA's consistent statements that it had "no concrete evidence of an ongoing nuclear weapons program or undeclared nuclear facilities in Iran."

In February 2009 testimony before the U.S. Senate, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair reaffirmed the conclusions of the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate and said "although we do not know whether Iran currently intends to develop nuclear weapons, we assess Tehran at a minimum is keeping open the option to develop them." He said Iran was unlikely to achieve a nuclear weapon before 2013 because of foreseeable technical and programmatic problems, and that this would be in the case that it decided to do so. Stephen Lendman, an American research associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization based in Canada, has argued Iran's commercial nuclear program is perfectly legal and that the U.S. has a double standard towards Iran's nuclear program. Joseph Cirincione, a nuclear weapons expert and president of the Ploughshares Fund, has said the Obama administration does not want to be drawn into a debate over Iran's intent because "when you're talking about negotiations in Iran, it is dangerous to appear weak or naive." The documentary film Iranium also explores this issue.

G8

Since 2003, when the IAEA began investigating Iran's previously undeclared nuclear activities, the G8 (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States) has repeatedly voiced its concerns over Iran's nuclear program. At the 2003 G8 summit in France, G8 leaders said: "We will not ignore the proliferation implications of Iran's advanced nuclear program." The 2004 G8 Action Plan on Nonproliferation "deplore[d] Iran's delays, deficiencies in cooperation, and inadequate disclosures, as detailed in IAEA Director General reports." In 2005 G8 leaders concluded that "It is essential that Iran provide the international community with objective guarantees that its nuclear program is exclusively for peaceful purposes in order to build international confidence."

In 2006, after Iran was found in non-compliance with its safeguards agreement and reported to the UN Security Council, the G8 toughened its position: "Iran not having shown willingness to engage in serious discussion of those proposals and having failed to take the steps needed to allow negotiations to begin, specifically the suspension of all enrichment related and reprocessing activities, as required by the IAEA and supported in the United Nations Security Council Presidential Statement, we supported the decision of those countries' Ministers to return the issue of Iran to the United Nations Security Council." The following year, G8 leaders "deplore[d] the fact that Iran [had] so far failed to meet its obligations under UNSC Resolutions 1696, 1737 and 1747," and threatened "further measures, should Iran refuse to comply with its obligations," but held out the prospect that "[i]nternational confidence in the exclusively peaceful nature of the Iranian nuclear program would permit a completely new chapter to be opened in our relations with Iran not only in the nuclear but also more broadly in the political, economic and technological fields."

At the most recent 2008 G8 summit in Japan in 2008, G8 leaders said:

We express our serious concern at the proliferation risks posed by Iran's nuclear programme and Iran's continued failure to meet its international obligations. We urge Iran to fully comply with UNSCRs 1696, 1737, 1747 and 1803 without further delay, and in particular to suspend all enrichment-related activities. We also urge Iran to fully cooperate with the IAEA, including by providing clarification of the issues contained in the latest report of the IAEA Director General. We firmly support and cooperate with the efforts by China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States supported by the High Representative of the EU to resolve the issue innovatively through negotiation, and urge Iran to respond positively to their offer delivered on June 14, 2008. We also commend the efforts by other G8 members, particularly the high-level dialogue by Japan, towards a peaceful and diplomatic resolution of the issue. We welcome the work of the Financial Action Task Force to assist states in implementing their financial obligations under the relevant UNSCRs.

Asian viewpoint

Indian viewpoint

India's rapidly developing ties with the United States and historically close ties with Iran have created difficulties for India's foreign policy makers. India, a nuclear power which is not party to the NPT, has expressed its concern over the possibility of another nuclear weapon-armed state in its neighborhood with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh stating that he was against Iran acquiring nuclear weapons. India voted in the IAEA Board of Governors to report Iran to UN Security Council in 2005 for non-compliance with its NPT safeguards agreement. Despite some domestic opposition, the Indian government later voted to report Iran to the UN Security Council in 2006. Leftist parties in India have criticized the government for bowing to US pressure on the issue.

India quickly downplayed the incident and restated its commitment to develop closer ties with Iran. India urged international diplomacy to solve the Iranian nuclear row but added that it could not "turn a blind eye to nuclear proliferation in its neighborhood."

Despite heavy U.S. criticism, India has continued negotiations on the multi-billion dollar Iran–Pakistan–India gas pipeline from Iran to India through Pakistan. India is keen to secure energy supplies to fuel its rapidly growing economy and the gas pipeline may address India's energy security concerns. The United States has expressed concern that the pipeline project would undermine international efforts to isolate Iran.

In-context of the Indo-US nuclear deal

India is not a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). According to US Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns, it was India's vote against Iran which helped clear the way for the US-India nuclear cooperation deal Critics say the US-India nuclear cooperation deal itself undermines the Non-Proliferation Treaty at a time when Iran was accused of violating the treaty. Critics argue that by promising nuclear cooperation with India, the Bush administration has reversed a legal ban on such cooperation which was in place since the passage of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Act of 1978, and violated US obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty which prohibits sharing nuclear technology with non-signatories such as India. The Harvard International Review concedes in an editorial that the Indo-US nuclear deal "undermines the world's present set of nuclear rules" but argues that the Iranian nuclear program remains an "unacceptable risk" regardless of the NPT. It reasoned that "regardless of what the NPT says, and regardless of what Iran says about the NPT, an Iranian nuclear program is still an unacceptable risk."

Pakistan viewpoint

In a speech at Harvard University in 2010, the Pakistani foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi argued that Iran had no justification to pursue nuclear weapons, citing the lack of any immediate threat to Iran, and urged Iran to embrace overtures from the United States. Qureshi also observed that Iran had signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and should respect the treaty.

Developing countries and the Non-Aligned Movement

On 16 September 2006, in Havana, Cuba, all of the 118 Non-Aligned Movement member countries, at the summit level, declared their support of Iran's civilian nuclear program in their final written statement. The Non-Aligned Movement represents a majority of the 192 countries comprising the entire United Nations.

On 30 July 2008, the Non-Aligned Movement welcomed the continuing cooperation of Iran with the IAEA and reaffirmed Iran's right to the peaceful uses of nuclear technology. The movement further called for the establishment of a nuclear weapons free zone in the Middle East and called for a comprehensive multilaterally negotiated instrument which prohibits threats of attacks on nuclear facilities devoted to peaceful uses of nuclear energy.

Other countries

Public opinion surveys conducted in 2006 in Iran's three neighboring countries of Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey found large numbers of people favoring the possibility of a nuclear-armed Iran and even greater numbers opposed to any American military action against Iran

In February 2007, lawmakers from 56 member states of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, addressing Iran's nuclear program at a meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, urged "full respect for equal and inalienable rights for all nations to explore modern technologies including nuclear energy for peaceful purposes."

Officials in several countries have voiced support for Iran in the on-going standoff with the US over its nuclear program. These include Iraq Algeria and Indonesia. Turkey has expressed support for Iran's right to a nuclear program for peaceful energy production, and along with Egypt has urged for a peaceful solution to the standoff. Former President Vladimir Putin of Russia, while urging more transparency from Iran, has said that there is no objective evidence that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons. On 11 September 2009, Prime Minister Putin opposed the use of force or further sanctions against Iran.

Support for tough measures against Iran's nuclear program has fallen in 13 out of 21 Arab countries according to a new BBC World Service Poll. According to a 2008 global poll of Arab public opinion, the Arab public does not appear to see Iran as a major threat and does not support international pressure to force Iran to curtail the program. Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa echoed remarks made by chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat, saying that Israel, not Iran, posed a nuclear threat to the Middle East.