Iran has roughly doubled its stockpile of near-bomb-grade uranium over the past three months even while negotiating with the Trump administration over a deal to limit its nuclear program, according to a confidential report that the United Nations’ nuclear inspection agency has begun circulating to capitals around the world.
The increase gives Tehran the capability to produce bomb-grade fuel for roughly 10 weapons, up from around five or six when President Trump was inaugurated in January. But the surge also puts new pressure on Washington in its negotiations, in which it is demanding that Iran cease all production of nuclear material.
Mr. Trump predicted last weekend that there could be an agreement with Iran within days. That did not happen, but on Friday he expressed optimism that it would come soon.
A pair of reports by the International Atomic Energy Agency, obtained by The New York Times, portray an Iranian regime that has decided to surge ahead with its production, presumably to gain leverage in negotiations headed by Steve Witkoff, Mr. Trump’s envoy for the Middle East. He began negotiations with Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, in early April.
The director general of the I.A.E.A., Rafael M. Grossi, said the report indicated that “we need to get to a diplomatic resolution, under a very robust I.A.E.A. inspection system.” In recent years, Iran has disabled many of the agency’s cameras and sensors at key sites, but has allowed inspectors to come into the country and measure its growing stockpiles of enriched uranium.
In one of the reports — a quarterly assessment of Iran’s nuclear production and stockpiles — Mr. Grossi wrote that “the significantly increased production and accumulation of highly enriched uranium by Iran, the only non-nuclear-weapon state to produce such nuclear material, is of serious concern.”
That report concluded that Iran’s stockpile of uranium enriched to 60 percent purity — just shy of the 90 percent needed to produce weapons — was now around 900 pounds, up from 605 pounds in February. While Iran could quickly boost that fuel to bomb-grade, it would take months, and maybe up to a year, to produce a workable weapon. U.S. intelligence officials concluded earlier this year that a secret team of Iranian scientists was working on a faster, cruder approach to building weapons, if need be.
The surge in Iranian production comes at a time when Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has urged Mr. Trump to join Israel in a military strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities. Mr. Netanyahu has argued that Iran’s primary fuel-production facilities in the cities of Natanz and Fordow are more vulnerable than at any time in years, after Israeli forces struck Iranian air defenses last October. The Times reported in April that Israel had planned to strike Iranian nuclear sites as soon as May, but was waved off by Mr. Trump.
Mr. Trump confirmed that story earlier this week, saying he had told Israel it would be “inappropriate” for it to bomb the facilities when he thought he was close to a deal. But he also contended that any diplomatic agreement reached by Mr. Witkoff would enable the United States to dismantle Iran’s nuclear production facilities — something the Iranians have said they would never permit.
“I want it very strong where we can go in with inspectors, we can take whatever we want, we can blow up whatever we want, but nobody’s getting killed. We can blow up a lab but nobody’s going to be in the lab,” Mr. Trump told reporters.
As the two I.A.E.A. reports began to circulate on Saturday morning, Mr. Netanyahu issued a statement saying that they painted a “grave” picture and that nations around the world must “act now to stop Iran.” But he issued no military threats. Israel is not a signatory to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and is widely believed to possess a nuclear arsenal of its own, of around 100 weapons.
The second report issued by the agency described a continued effort by Iran to stonewall the agency’s inspectors as they have sought access, for more than nine years, to military sites where the agency believed the country conducted nuclear experiments more than two decades ago.
Experts suspect those experiments were part of a covert program, in the early 2000s, to develop a nuclear weapon. U.S. intelligence concluded, during the Bush administration, that the program was suspended in 2003. Israel maintains that elements of the program continued, driven by Iran’s top nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh. Israel assassinated Mr. Fakhrizadeh as he drove to his weekend house in late 2020, in an artificial intelligence-assisted, robotic attack.
Iran has steadfastly denied that the sites were part of a nuclear program. The report describes, in dry technical language, how Iranian officials provided intelligence reports and news stories that they said proved that nuclear material had been planted at the sites. The inspectors dismissed the Iranian explanation, citing a “lack of technically credible answers.”
It is unclear whether Mr. Witkoff, as part of an agreement, will insist that Iran come clean about its past activity.
David E. Sanger covers the Trump administration and a range of national security issues. He has been a Times journalist for more than four decades and has written four books on foreign policy and national security challenges.
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