Iran used a special meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Board of Governors on Friday to issue a stark warning: the repeated bombing of its safeguarded nuclear facilities by the United States and Israel represents the “most extensive and unprecedented” attacks on such sites in the agency’s history. The Iranian delegation invoked the IAEA’s own precedent—the 1981 Israeli strike on Iraq’s Osirak reactor—recalling that the Board and General Conference had consistently declared any use of force against peaceful nuclear installations a violation of the UN Charter and international law. Tehran demanded a “zero tolerance” policy to prevent the normalisation of strikes on peaceful atomic infrastructure, an outcome it argued would gravely undermine the global non-proliferation regime.

The diplomatic protest unfolded against a backdrop of intensified military action during two recent conflicts: the 12-day war and the Ramadan war, in which US and Israeli forces launched a combined 17 waves of attacks on Iranian nuclear sites, including one perilously close to the Bushehr power plant. These strikes, Iranian officials said, are directly responsible for the IAEA’s current inability to monitor certain facilities. The agency’s confidential report, circulated on Thursday, warned that the lack of access was fuelling “concerns of nuclear proliferation” and urged Iran to cooperate “constructively.” Iran retorted that the missing oversight was a casualty of war, not a failure of compliance.

Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi, writing on social media, crystallised the charge of politicisation: “If the agency wants to be part of a diplomatic solution, it must refrain from turning a technical report into a tool of political pressure.” He noted that IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi had yet to condemn the attacks, which he described as a “direct blow to nuclear safety” and a violation of Iranian sovereignty. “One cannot ignore the source of the disruption,” Gharibabadi added, “and then present the very consequences of that disruption as a complaint against Iran.” The remarks reflect a deeper grievance in Tehran: that the watchdog is applying a double standard, failing to censure military strikes while penalising the victim.

Viewed from London and other European capitals, the standoff injects fresh tension into already fragile nuclear diplomacy. Both rounds of hostilities erupted while Iran and the United States were engaged in talks over Tehran’s nuclear programme, a pattern that has led some analysts to suspect deliberate sabotage. With the IAEA’s technical credibility at stake, the risk is that a cycle of accusation and counter-accusation will harden positions. If the Board of Governors does not robustly address the attacks, Iran warns, it will set a dangerous precedent: that striking nuclear facilities under safeguards can become a routine instrument of coercion, eroding the very foundations of the safeguards system.