Iran and nuclear weapons

Iran, also known as Persia, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, is not known to currently possess weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and has signed treaties repudiating the possession of weapons of mass destruction including the Biological Weapons Convention, the Chemical Weapons Convention, and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Iran has first-hand knowledge of WMD effects—over 100,000 Iranian troops and civilians were victims of chemical weapons during the 1980s Iran–Iraq War. On ideological grounds, a public and categorical religious decree (fatwa) against the development, production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons has been issued by the Supreme Leader of Iran Ayatollah Ali Khamenei along with other clerics, though it is approved by some relatively minor clerics. Later versions of this fatwa forbid only the "use" of nuclear weapons, but said nothing about their production. Iran has stated its uranium enrichment program is exclusively for peaceful purposes. The IAEA has confirmed the non-diversion of declared nuclear material in Iran but has also said it "needs to have confidence in the absence of possible military dimensions to Iran’s nuclear program.

In December 2014, a Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control report by Lincy and Milhollin based on International Atomic Energy Agency data concluded that Iran could produce enough weapons-grade uranium for one nuclear warhead in 1.7 months In 2012, sixteen U.S. intelligence agencies, including the CIA, reported that Iran was pursuing research that could enable it to produce nuclear weapons, but was not attempting to do so. The senior officers of all of the major American intelligence agencies stated that there was no conclusive evidence that Iran has made any attempt to produce nuclear weapons since 2003. In a 2007 National Intelligence Estimate, the United States Intelligence Community assessed that Iran had ended all "nuclear weapon design and weaponization work" in 2003. U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta stated in January 2012 that Iran was pursuing a nuclear weapons capability, but was not attempting to produce nuclear weapons. In 2009, U.S. intelligence assessed that Iranian intentions were unknown. Some European intelligence believe Iran has resumed its alleged nuclear weapons design work. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said he had seen no evidence of any nuclear weapons program in Iran, while Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said Iran was close to having the capability to produce nuclear weapons. Iran has called for nuclear weapons states to disarm and for the Middle East to be a nuclear weapon free zone.

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Wikipedia