Mohamed Elbaradei

When Mohamed ElBaradei was selected as director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency in 1997, he was known as a reserved bureaucrat who enjoyed the backing of the United States and was unlikely to make waves. Twelve years later, he is leaving at the end of the month with a Nobel Peace Prize to his name and a reputation among his admirers for speaking truth to power, having stood up to the George W. Bush administration over Iraq and Iran. Meanwhile, much of the world has continued to pursue nuclear weapons: India and Pakistan conducted successful nuclear tests to prove what they had, North Korea developed a nuclear bomb, and Iran acquired about 5,000 centrifuges and more than 3,000 pounds of low-enriched uranium.

In unusually direct language, the outgoing chief of the United Nations' nuclear watchdog agency on Thursday took Tehran to task for failing to resolve unanswered questions about its nuclear program and lamented a "dead end" in resolving the standoff between the Islamic Republic and world powers. Mohamed ElBaradei, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said world powers had made no progress over the last year in settling concerns about Iran's nuclear program, which the West worries is meant to ultimately produce weapons but Tehran insists is for civilian purposes only.

As the head of the U.N. nuclear monitoring agency arrived in Iran on Saturday, the country's president declared that it had reported the existence of a new nuclear site earlier than required. Mohamed ElBaradei, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, is in Tehran to arrange an inspection of the uranium enrichment facility near the holy city of Qom. The revelation that Iran has been building the nuclear plant has heightened the concern of the United States and many of its allies, which suspect that Tehran is using a civilian nuclear program as a cover for developing weapons-making capability.

A succession battle over the once-obscure leadership post of the world's arms control watchdog could affect attempts to persuade Iran to dismantle its nuclear infrastructure and shape the direction of nuclear nonproliferation efforts for the next four years. Abdul Samad Minty, a South African, and Yukiya Amano of Japan are the front-runners to take over as director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency after the term of Mohamed ElBaradei expires this year.

The chief of the world's nuclear weapons watchdog organization considers five years of U.S. and international efforts to rein in Iran's nuclear ambitions a failure, as Tehran moves ever closer to obtaining the means to develop weapons of mass destruction. The United Nations Security Council has imposed three sets of sanctions to try to get Iran to halt uranium enrichment and other activities, while the United States and Europe have offered economic and security incentives.

The United Nations' chief nuclear watchdog provided a singularly bleak vision of a world "in disarray" Saturday, warning that the most imminent threat is not a new nation joining the nuclear club, but deadly material falling into the hands of extremists.

The head of the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog agency said Monday that the inquiry into Iran's nuclear case was not closed, as the country's president proclaimed to the United Nations last month, and called it regrettable that Iran continued to enrich uranium despite the Security Council's demand to stop the process.

The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency said he had not seen "any concrete evidence" that Iran has a secret nuclear weapons program underway. "We have seen in the past that certain procurements have not been reported to us, certain experiments," Mohamed ElBaradei of the International Atomic Energy Agency told CNN.

The head of the United Nations' nuclear watchdog agency said Thursday that Iran was operating only several hundred centrifuges at its uranium enrichment plant at Natanz, despite its claims to have activated 3,000. Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said Iran's nuclear program was a concern but discounted its claims of a major advance in uranium enrichment, a process the U.N. demands Iran suspend or face increasing sanctions.

In a fresh sign of easing tensions, North Korean officials Friday invited the chief of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency to visit Pyongyang next month to develop plans aimed at dismantling the nation's nuclear weapons program, officials said here.