IAEA cannot verify Iran’s nuclear material after 2025–26 strikes; Board demands inventories and access

The IAEA Board of Governors adopted resolution GOV/2026/40 on 10 June 2026 during its 1812th session. The resolution was adopted with 21 in favour, 3 against and 10 abstentions. It does not identify how members voted. The text addresses implementation of Iran’s NPT Safeguards Agreement (INFCIRC/214) and relevant Security Council resolutions.

That Safeguards Agreement entered into force on 15 May 1974. Security Council resolution 2231 (2015), adopted on 20 July 2015, endorsed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action concluded on 14 July 2015. On 8 May 2018 the President of the United States announced that the United States would withdraw from the JCPOA and begin reinstating U.S. nuclear sanctions.

The Board had before it the Director General’s report GOV/2026/33 of 4 June 2026. That report states that, except for an inspection and design-information examinations at Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant on 1–3 June 2026, the Agency has not received information from Iran on the status of its other declared nuclear facilities or location outside facilities, or associated nuclear material, and has not had in-field access to them. With that exception, the Agency says it has been unable to discharge its safeguards responsibilities at declared facilities in Iran.

GOV/2026/33 records the military sequence as follows. On 13 June 2025 the Director General reported that the Agency had been informed of a military operation launched by Israel, which included attacks on several of Iran’s nuclear facilities between 13 and 24 June 2025. On 22 June 2025 the United States conducted attacks on three of Iran’s nuclear facilities. The Agency stopped verification activities at the commencement of the military attacks and, by the end of June 2025, withdrew all of its inspectors from Iran for safety reasons. A White House release dated 25 June 2025 quoted the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff as saying that initial battle-damage assessments indicated “all three sites sustained extremely severe damage and destruction.” That is a United States statement. It is not an IAEA verification of the condition of the material. On 28 February 2026 the United States and Israel launched further military attacks on Iran, including on the sites of some nuclear facilities, and the Agency again stopped verification activities. A War Powers letter dated 2 March 2026 from the President of the United States describes the 28 February strikes as precision strikes against ballistic-missile sites, maritime mining capabilities, air defences, and command and control. That letter does not name Fordow, Natanz, or Isfahan. The IAEA report still records those attacks as including the sites of some nuclear facilities.

The seven declared facilities the Agency assesses were affected by the June 2025 attacks and which had contained declared nuclear material before those attacks are the Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant (FFEP); the Fuel Enrichment Plant (FEP) and Pilot Fuel Enrichment Plant (PFEP) at Natanz; and, at Isfahan, the Uranium Conversion Facility (UCF), Fuel Manufacturing Plant (FMP), Fuel Plate Fabrication Plant (FPFP) and Enriched UO2 Powder Plant (EUPP). The Khondab Heavy Water Research Reactor, then under construction and without nuclear material, was also affected. GOV/2025/65 records that on 12 June 2025 Iran notified the Agency of a new enrichment facility, the Isfahan Fuel Enrichment Plant (IFEP); planned design-information examination and verification were cancelled when the military attacks began, and no verification has been conducted there. The Agency states that it does not know the precise location of IFEP, whether it contains nuclear material, or whether it was affected. Iran informed the Agency in February 2026 that IFEP had been “subjected” to military attacks. Iran has not confirmed to the Agency the current status, for safeguards purposes, of these affected facilities and associated nuclear material.

On commercially available satellite imagery, the Agency reported regular vehicular activity around the entrance to the Isfahan tunnel complex in which UF6 enriched up to 20% and 60% U-235 was stored; damage to entrance buildings of the Natanz FEP observed on 3 March 2026; damage to a structure about 350 metres from the Bushehr reactor; and severe damage at the Khondab Heavy Water Production Plant, which is not a nuclear facility. GOV/2026/8, dated 27 February 2026, likewise records satellite observations of vehicular activity at the Isfahan tunnel complex and of activities at some affected facilities, including the enrichment plants at Natanz and Fordow, and states that without access it is not possible to confirm the nature and purpose of those activities. Neither report treats that imagery as a substitute for in-field verification of nuclear material.

Based on information provided by Iran up to 12 June 2025, previous verification, and estimates from past operating records, the Agency’s last estimate of Iran’s total enriched uranium stockpile, as of 13 June 2025, was 9,874.9 kg, comprising 9,040.5 kg as UF6 and 834.4 kg in other forms. The UF6 portion comprised 2,391.1 kg enriched up to 2% U-235; 6,024.4 kg up to 5%; 184.1 kg up to 20%; and 440.9 kg up to 60%. The Agency had verified 432.9 kg of that 440.9 kg as UF6. Paragraph 43 of GOV/2026/33 states that Iran is the only NPT non-nuclear-weapon State to have produced and accumulated uranium enriched up to 60% U-235, and that it had accumulated 440.9 kg by the time of the June 2025 military attacks. The same paragraph describes the Agency’s lack of access to verify the previously declared high-enriched and low-enriched uranium, for nearly a year, as a matter of proliferation concern and of compliance, and says continuity of knowledge over previously declared nuclear material at affected facilities needs to be addressed with the utmost urgency.

GOV/2026/40 does not adopt a new non-compliance finding. It recalls the Board’s resolution of 12 June 2025 in GOV/2025/38, which found that Iran’s many failures since 2019 to provide full and timely cooperation regarding undeclared nuclear material and activities at multiple undeclared locations, as detailed in GOV/2025/25, constitute non-compliance with its Safeguards Agreement in the context of Article XII.C of the Agency’s Statute. GOV/2026/33 states that during the latest reporting period Iran has not engaged the Agency on those unresolved issues. The June 2026 resolution notes with grave concern the year-long gap on previously declared material, including a large amount of high-enriched uranium; affirms that it is essential and urgent that Iran provide complete information on nuclear material inventories and design information and grant all access required to verify that information; stresses that the Safeguards Agreement cannot be unilaterally amended or suspended; restates Iran’s obligation to implement modified Code 3.1; and keeps open further action, including the timing and content of the report required under Article XII.C for consideration by the Security Council as provided for in GOV/2025/38.

GOV/2026/33 states that Iran stopped implementing modified Code 3.1 on 23 February 2021 and stopped provisionally applying its Additional Protocol in February 2021. The Director General reports that Iran remains the only State with significant nuclear activities in which the Agency is implementing a comprehensive safeguards agreement that is not implementing modified Code 3.1.

On 2 July 2025, according to GOV/2026/33, the President of Iran signed into force a law suspending cooperation with the Agency. The Director General’s position, recorded in that report, is that implementation of the Safeguards Agreement cannot be suspended under any circumstances. On 9 September 2025 the Director General and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi signed an agreement in Cairo on practical steps for safeguards implementation after the armed attacks. On 20 November 2025 Iran informed the Director General that the Cairo agreement was “no longer valid and shall henceforth be regarded as terminated.” In a letter of 2 February 2026 Iran stated that “the conditions resulting from acts of aggression and the continuation of threats have created a situation in which the normal implementation of safeguards is legally untenable and materially impracticable” and that “it would be inconsistent with Iran’s essential security considerations.” INFCIRC/1343, circulating a 2 March 2026 note, records Iran’s assertions that Agency requests for access to all facilities not affected by the attacks were approved; that, given the attacks, Iran is “currently not in a position to determine the exact amount and status of nuclear materials that may have been lost”; and that the Agency should not expect safeguards measures “to be implemented under such wartime conditions as if hostilities had not occurred.” Those statements are Iran’s. The Agency has not verified the amount or status of material at the affected sites. The Director General was in attendance at indirect negotiations between the United States and Iran in Geneva on 17 and 26 February 2026.

Whether prior Security Council resolutions on Iran apply again is stated differently in the documents cited here. On 28 August 2025 France, Germany and the United Kingdom wrote to the President of the Security Council that they believe Iran is in significant non-performance of its JCPOA commitments and “hereby invoke the process known as the ‘snapback’ mechanism,” citing paragraph 11 of resolution 2231 (2015). Board resolution GOV/2025/71 of 20 November 2025 notes that the provisions of resolutions 1696 (2006), 1737 (2006), 1747 (2007), 1803 (2008), 1835 (2008) and 1929 (2010) shall apply from 28 September 2025 in the same manner as they applied before resolution 2231 (2015), and requests the Director General to implement and report on those provisions. GOV/2026/40 and GOV/2026/33 write against that frame, including Iran’s obligation under resolution 1737 to suspend enrichment-related, reprocessing and heavy-water work. INFCIRC/1323 circulates a letter of 24 October 2025 from the resident representatives of China, Iran and the Russian Federation stating that invocation of snapback by the E3 is legally and procedurally flawed, that the E3 lack standing, and that all provisions of resolution 2231 terminated on 18 October 2025. INFCIRC/1340 records Iran’s position that snapback, and measures adopted on the basis thereof, are “without legal basis, null and void, and devoid of any legal effect.”

Separately, on 24 August 2026 the Director of the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control determined that section 1(a)(i) of Executive Order 13902 shall apply to the aviation, digital asset, gold, shipping, and technology sectors of the Iranian economy. The determination was published in the Federal Register on 27 August 2026 (91 FR 55265). It is a unilateral United States sanctions measure, not an IAEA or Security Council instrument.