Chaos over West’s Iran policy: US intelligence stutters over nuclear programme and Iran rejects uranium exchange proposal

Robin Shepherd
Robin Shepherd Online
20 January '10

US led efforts to stop Iran acquiring nuclear weapons descended into chaos today as it emerged that Iran had rejected proposals to ship enriched uranium out of the country to prevent Tehran from processing it to weapon’s grade and the US National Intelligence Council (NIC) indicated a merely partial reversal of its infamous 2007 “estimate” that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons programme in 2003.

Iran’s rejection of the uranium plan was conveyed to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna while developments at the NIC emerged from an exclusive report by the Reuters news agency which quoted unnamed officials as saying they now believed that Iran was researching a nuclear weapons programme but not necessarily developing one:

“Basically, we’re talking about research (resuming) — not about the Iranians barrelling full steam ahead on a bomb program,” a U.S. official was quoted by Reuters as saying on condition of anonymity.

Taking these two developments together, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that Western policy on Iran’s nuclear programme has all but fallen apart.

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