Iran seems intent on confronting the world. Remarkably, the international community has mustered a unified response to the Tehran government's seeming determination to build a nuclear weapon. But brinkmanship continues: Last weekend Tehran said it was ending its commitment to the Additional Protocol of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), a move that severely curtails the ability of international nuclear regulators to ensure that Iran is not cheating and building a bomb. Iran must reverse that decision.
For nearly three years, there have been mounting suspicions about the forces driving Iran's nuclear program. Tehran insists that it is exercising its right as a member of the NPT to develop a domestic nuclear-energy program. Its critics believe that the civilian energy effort is a cover for a clandestine nuclear-weapons program. The debate continues without resolution, but the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the world's nuclear watchdog, has enough doubts to be concerned.
To quell those suspicions, in 2003 Iran agreed to let the IAEA monitor its nuclear sites and perform snap inspections at facilities as permitted by the Additional Protocol. That decision was a confidence-building measure to spur negotiations Tehran was holding with Britain, France and Germany on the nuclear issue. Those governments were trying to fashion a "grand bargain" that would provide Iran security and economic incentives in exchange for that country's abandonment of any nuclear ambitions.