catastrophic, haunting us for generations in that part of the world." In 2011, the senior officers of all of the major American intelligence agencies stated that there was no conclusive evidence that Iran has made any attempt to produce nuclear weapons since 2003. In January 2012, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta stated that Iran was pursuing a nuclear weapons capability, but was not attempting to produce nuclear weapons. In 2012, sixteen United States intelligence agencies, including the CIA, reported that Iran was pursuing research that could enable it to produce nuclear weapons, but was not attempting to do so. As of 2021, Joe Biden's Secretary of State Antony Blinken did not rule out a military intervention to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. Other international responses United Nations In 2009, the United Nations built a seismic monitoring station in Turkmenistan near its border with Iran, to detect tremors from nuclear explosions. The UN Security Council has demanded Iran freeze all forms of uranium enrichment. Iran has argued these demands unfairly compel it to abandon its rights under the Nuclear NonProliferation Treaty to peaceful nuclear technology for civilian energy purposes. On 29 December 2009, Zongo Saidou, a sanctions advisor for the U.N., said that as far as he knew, none of the U.N.'s member nations had alerted the sanctions committee about allegations of sales of uranium to Iran from Kazakhstan. "We don't have any official information yet regarding this kind of exchange between the two countries," Saidou said. "I don't have any information; I don't have any proof," Saidou said. An intelligence report from an unknown country alleged that rogue employees of Kazakhstan were prepared to sell Iran 1,350 tons of purified uranium ore in violation of UN Security Council sanctions. Russia said it had no knowledge of an alleged Iranian plan to import purified uranium ore from Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan denied the reports. "Such fabrications of news are part of the psychological warfare (against Iran) to serve the political interests of the hegemonic powers," Iran said. Askar Abdrahmanov, the official representative of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan, said "the references to the anonymous sources and unknown documents show groundlessness of these insinuations." China The Chinese Foreign Ministry supports the peaceful resolution of the Iran nuclear issue through diplomacy and negotiations. In May 2006 Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Liu Jianchao stated "As a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, Iran enjoys