By: Meir Javedanfar

Iran’s nuclear program ^[1] continues to make headlines. This time, for those who enjoy spy stories.

A prime target for many intelligence agencies around the world, it seems that agencies of countries such as Holland, who are not on Iran’s number one list of enemies, have been very active, and “extremely successful ^[2]” in gathering information on Iran’s nuclear program. This is in addition to intelligence agencies of other European countries, as discussed in “The Nuclear Sphinx of Tehran ^[3]”.

According to a story in the Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf ^[4], the information gathered by Holland’s secret service (known by its Dutch acronym as AIVD ^[5] ) has been shared with the CIA. Notwithstanding Holland’s good relations with Israel, one can assume that Jerusalem could have also been the recipient of the Dutch perspective on Iran’s nuclear program.

Of course such reports can also be viewed as psychological warfare to make Iran more nervous.

In any case, the Iranians are most probably going to strengthen their counter intelligence capabilities, because they are aware of the increasing motivation and capability of foreign intelligence agencies to find out as much as possible, so that no mistakes are made (unlike Iraq).

Furthermore, president Ahmadinejad ^[6] and his unpopular economic policies ^[7] probably make the job of recruiting disgruntled Iranians easier. Thus adding to the importance of creating a stronger counter intelligence organization.