UN N-body chief says Tehran could be enriching uranium within months

Iran could be producing enriched uranium in a few months, the head of the UN nuclear watchdog Rafael Grossi was quoted as saying on Sunday, raising doubts about how effective US strikes to destroy Tehran’s nuclear programme have been.

US officials have stated that their strikes obliterated key nuclear sites in Iran, although US President Donald Trump said on Friday he would consider bombing Iran again if Tehran is enriching uranium to worrisome levels.

“The capacities they have are there. They can have, you know, in a matter of months, I would say, a few cascades of centrifuges spinning and producing enriched uranium, or less than that,” Grossi told CBS News in an interview.

“Frankly speaking, one cannot claim that everything has disappeared and there is nothing there,” he added, according to the transcript of an interview on “Face the Nation” with Margaret Brennan due to air on Sunday.

Saying it wanted to remove any chance of Tehran developing nuclear weapons, Israel launched attacks on Iran earlier this month, igniting a 12-day air war that the US eventually joined.

Iran says its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes only.

Grossi, who heads the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, said the strikes on sites in Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan had significantly set back Iran’s ability to convert and enrich uranium.

However, Western powers stress that Iran’s nuclear advances provide it with an irreversible knowledge gain, suggesting that while losing experts or facilities may slow progress, the advances are permanent.

“Iran is a very sophisticated country in terms of nuclear technology,” Grossi said. “So you cannot disinvent this. You cannot undo the knowledge that you have or the capacities that you have.”

Grossi was also asked about reports of Iran moving its stock of highly enriched uranium in the run-up to the U.S. strikes and said it was not clear where that material was.

“So some could have been destroyed as part of the attack, but some could have been moved,” he said.

Meanwhile, Iranian armed forces Chief of Staff told Saudi Arabia’s Defence Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman that Iran was highly doubtful that Israel would maintain the ceasefire that ended an air war between the two countries.

“Since we have complete doubts about the enemy's (Israel) adherence to its commitments, including the ceasefire, we are prepared to give it a strong response if it repeats the aggression,” Abdolrahim Mousavi said.

Conundrum for N-inspectors

The US and Israeli bombing of Iranian nuclear sites creates a conundrum for UN inspectors in Iran: how can you tell if enriched uranium stocks, some of them near weapons grade, were buried beneath the rubble or had been secretly hidden away?

IAEA chief Rafael Grossi said on Monday it was highly likely the sensitive centrifuges used to enrich uranium inside Fordow were badly damaged. It’s far less clear whether Iran’s 9 tonnes of enriched uranium — more than 400 kg of it enriched to close to weapons grade were destroyed.

Western governments are scrambling to determine what’s become of it.

Olli Heinonen, previously the IAEA’s top inspector from 2005 to 2010, said the search would probably involve complicated recovery of materials from damaged buildings as well as forensics and environmental sampling, which take a long time.

Iran’s 60% uranium is enough, if enriched further, for nine nuclear weapons, according to an IAEA yardstick. Even a fraction of that left unaccounted for would be a grave concern for Western powers that believe Iran is at least keeping the option of nuclear weapons open.

Experts say there is no reason for enriching uranium to 60% for a civilian nuclear programme, which can run on less than 5% enrichment. As a party to the NPT, Iran must account for its stock of enriched uranium.