Iran has been systematically providing false information to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) because it has been infiltrated by intelligence agencies keeping tabs on Iran’s nuclear program, Israel Hayom reported, citing the the Al-Hayat newspaper.

Iranian Atomic Energy Vice President Fereydoun Abbasi Davani, who heads the country’s delegation taking part in the 56th session of the agency in Vienna, made the revelation in an interview with Al-Hayat.

“The IAEA says it gets its information from the intelligence services belonging to the member states, and we monitor and followed up seven years ago activities of the British foreign intelligence service [MI6], which gathered information for people, which then exposed [Iranian nuclear scientists] to assassination at the hands of Zionist intelligence agents. Some of the information provided by the agency related to these events. For our part, we sometimes gave false information to protect our nuclear sites and our interests. This inevitably misled other intelligence agencies,” Davani said.

On Thursday, Israel said it would not attend a conference on the creation of a nuclear-free Middle East scheduled to take place in Finland.

“This announcement was made on Wednesday in Vienna during a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency by the director of the Israel Atomic Energy Commission, Shaul Chorev,” spokesman Yigal Palmor told AFP.