Columbia International Affairs Online: Policy Briefs

CIAO DATE: 12/2010

The U.S.-UAE Peaceful Nuclear Cooperation Agreement: A Gold Standard or Fool's Gold?

Fred McGoldrick

November 2010

Center for Strategic and International Studies

Abstract

It is hard to know what is more disturbing-Iran's continued defiance of UN Security Council Resolutions ordering Tehran to cease its uranium enrichment activities and to cooperate with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), or the tour that North Korea recently gave to U.S. scientists of its new uranium enrichment plant. Policymakers fear that these programs will enable these states to produce more fissile materials for nuclear weapons.