As tensions rise between Iran and the United States and Israel, the US has this week announced that it is reducing staff numbers in its embassy in Iraq, while US defence secretary Pete Hegseth has authorised the voluntary departure of dependents of military personnel right across the Middle East.
Both moves came after the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, found Iran is not complying with its commitments to international nuclear safeguards. The agency’s resolution said that Tehran has failed to explain how uranium traces detected at undeclared sites came to be there and has not complied with inspections by its staff.
Binyamin Netanyahu’s government in Israel remains insistent that Iran is the main threat to the entire region. This morning (13 June), it launched strikes on Iran’s nuclear programme, having repeatedly warned it would do so unless Tehran backed down and observed its international obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
