IAEA

The International Atomic Energy Agency holds a contradictory dual mandate: promoting peaceful nuclear energy while preventing nuclear weapons proliferation. This tension is structural, not incidental — the 1957 Statute requires the IAEA to simultaneously accelerate the spread of nuclear technology and ensure it isn't weaponised. The agency's safeguards system monitors over 1,300 facilities in 185 countries, but inspection rights are limited by what states agree to in their safeguards agreements. Iran's nuclear programme exposed the gap: the IAEA detected undeclared enrichment activities but lacked authority to compel access to military sites without Security Council backing. North Korea simply withdrew from the Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2003 and expelled inspectors. The IAEA's real power is informational — its reports provide the evidentiary basis for Security Council sanctions — but enforcement depends entirely on the political will of states whose own nuclear arsenals are exempt from inspection.