The status of a key part of Iran's nuclear program remains unknown while international inspectors have yet to gain access to nuclear facilities, the International Atomic Energy Agency reported on Tuesday, as the country’s six-month conflict with the United States shows no signs of resolution.
IAEA monitors cannot verify the location or status of Iran’s stockpile of near-bomb grade uranium, according to the 11-page restricted report that was sent to member states and cited by Bloomberg and Reuters.
“The agency’s lack of information about this nuclear material and access to facilities to verify it is a matter of proliferation concern,” IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi wrote in the report.
He added that Iran needs to allow inspectors back in “with the utmost urgency.”
The IAEA report on Iran followed Grossi's visit to Washington. It also came as the US launched a new wave of strikes against targets in Iran, increasing tensions as both countries compete for control of the Strait of Hormuz waterway.
Grossi repeated his demands for Iran to allow inspectors to resume their work and called for a negotiated resolution to the US-Iran conflict.
Stockpiles Cannot Be Verified
The report on Iran showed there had again been no progress. Inspectors have yet to return to nuclear sites the United States and Israel bombed in June 2025.
Until those attacks, the IAEA estimates Iran had 440.9 kg of uranium enriched to up to 60% purity, a short step from the roughly 90% of weapons-grade uranium. That is enough material, if enriched further, for 10 nuclear weapons, according to an IAEA yardstick, and Iran also had material enriched to lower levels.
Before the June 2025 strikes, the IAEA reported that Iran held approximately 8,599.6 kilograms of low-enriched uranium alongside over 440 kilograms of highly enriched uranium, according to Bloomberg.
How much of that remains is unclear.
“It is more than a year since the Agency lost continuity of knowledge in relation to the previously declared inventories of LEU (low-enriched uranium) and HEU (highly enriched uranium) enriched up to 60% U-235 at the declared nuclear facilities affected by the attacks of June 2025,” the report said.
“The Agency's lack of information about this nuclear material and access to facilities to verify it is a matter of proliferation concern ... and needs to be addressed with the utmost urgency,” it added.
IAEA inspections of Iran dropped by more than half last year after the country imposed new restrictions following a 12-day conflict in which Israel and the US attacked its nuclear sites.
Inspectors will be allowed to visit Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant in mid-September, the IAEA reported.
A War that Disrupted the Nuclear Path
Uncertainty around Iran’s nuclear program has exasperated with the war that began on February 28, when the United States and Israel launched attacks on Iran.
Since then, Washington and Tehran witnessed several months of fighting and attempts to negotiate, before reaching a tentative understanding in June. The accord was supposed to allow the agency access to Iran’s nuclear sites and begin a new set of talks on Iran’s nuclear program, but that agreement quickly collapsed.
US President Donald Trump insists that military action is necessary to ensure Iran never acquires a nuclear weapon.
Iran has always denied seeking a nuclear weapon but has never satisfactorily explained to the agency why it has enriched uranium to 60%.
The IAEA report comes before a meeting next week of the agency’s board of governors in Vienna to consider a new resolution censuring Iran.
