Iran is a long way from having nuclear weapon: Powell

KUWAIT CITY: Iran is a long way from acquiring a nuclear weapon and is "foolish" for not investing its resources in its people instead of a nuclear programme, said former US Secretary of State, Colin Powell.

"I think Iran is a long way from having anything that could be anything like a nuclear weapon," Powell told a gathering of bankers, businessmen and diplomats, on Sunday.

Tehran rejects claims by the US and some European Union countries that its nuclear programme is aimed at secretly producing weapons and insists it is for peaceful purposes only.

"I think the Iranians are being very foolish," Powell said.

"When I look at Iran, I see the needs they have. They have not globalized, they have not come up in the international economic community. They are faced with 40 per cent unemployment."

Powell was invited by the National Bank of Kuwait to speak on economic opportunity and crisis in the Middle East.

A report released last week by the United Nation's nuclear watchdog agency found Iran has been generally truthful in the information it has provided the agency about aspects of its past nuclear activities. But the International Atomic Energy Agency said it still could not rule out that Iran had a secret weapons programme because of restrictions Tehran placed on its inspectors two years ago.

Asked if he sees a US war on Iran coming, the retired US general said although no American official will say that the option was "off the table," he did not see prospects of a military conflict with the Islamic republic.