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Conflict coverage · Iran–Gulf

State actor

International Atomic Energy Agency — Iran safeguards

The Agency is in this module for one reason: it is the only body that can establish, rather than assert, what Iran's nuclear programme is doing — and since 28 February 2026 it has not been able to. It has no security role, takes no position on the war, and its value here is precisely that it reports what it verified and refuses to report what it did not. The dominant fact on the nuclear file is therefore not a programme status but the absence of one: the Agency states it cannot provide any information on the current size, composition or whereabouts of Iran's enriched uranium. That absence is analytically meaningful in itself, and it does not point in either direction.

External powersVerification authority · no security role

Last reviewed
2026-09-04

AssessmentHigh confidence

Figures carry their own uncertainty. Population, economic and military-spending data in wartime are estimates, often contested; every figure below shows its as-of date and a confidence grade, and leadership positions reflect the last review date and change without notice.

Verification activities in Iran stopped
Verification status
EST · AS OF 2026-02-28 · Confidence: High · The Agency stopped conducting verification activities in Iran on this date. Access had already been lost to all safeguarded facilities except Bushehr from 13 June 2025.
20 declared nuclear sites and one location outside facilities
Access denied
EST · AS OF 2026-06-04 · Confidence: High · The scope stated in the Agency's own June 2026 reporting. Facility names beyond those already canonical in this module are not published here.
Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant — inspection and design information verification, 1–3 June 2026
Only site inspected
EST · AS OF 2026-06-03 · Confidence: High · Refuelling oversight at one power reactor. It establishes nothing about enrichment, inventories or any other declared site.
440.9 kg of uranium enriched to up to 60% U-235
Last verified 60% stockpile
EST · AS OF 2025-06-13 · Confidence: High · A HISTORICAL BASELINE, not a current inventory. It is what the Agency last verified before it lost access, and how much remains and where is unknown. This module does not carry a 2026 figure and does not calculate one.
Resolution urging Iran to cooperate with the Agency adopted
Board of Governors
EST · AS OF 2026-06-10 · Confidence: Moderate

What the Agency says it cannot verify

Its June 2026 reporting is explicit and itemised. It cannot verify whether Iran has suspended all enrichment-related activities including research and development; whether it has suspended reprocessing; the size of its uranium stockpile; whether it has suspended work on heavy-water projects; or its inventories of centrifuges and related equipment. Those five items are the substance of the file, and the honest statement about every one of them is that it is currently unverified.

Why no access is not an answer

This is the most important epistemic rule in the module and it cuts both ways. The absence of inspection does not establish that Iran suspended enrichment, and it does not establish that Iran continued it. A reader who takes the gap as evidence for either proposition has drawn a conclusion the evidence does not support, and Vigil will not draw it for them. The Agency has lost continuity of knowledge; that is a statement about what can be known, not about what is happening.

Enrichment capability is not a weapon

Five things are routinely collapsed into one and this module keeps them apart: enrichment capability, fissile material holdings, weaponisation activity, delivery systems and political intent. Holding highly enriched uranium does not establish weapon assembly, and missile capability is not nuclear weaponisation. The Agency's Director General stated on 4 March 2026 that the Agency never had information indicating a structured, systematic Iranian programme to build a nuclear weapon; the United States President has publicly asserted proximity to a weapon. Those are different claims by different bodies with different evidentiary standing, and the module grades each rather than averaging them.

An agreement on access is not access

In September 2025 the Director General and Iran's foreign minister agreed practical modalities to resume inspection activities. Inspections did not resume. The distinction between a stated intention to restore access and a completed inspection is therefore not a theoretical one in this file — it has already failed once, and it is why the module's verification observable watches for inspections carried out rather than for undertakings given.

Elsewhere in Iran–Gulf

Economic profileAll Iran–Gulf profiles
Confidence: HighThe access state, the itemised list of what cannot be verified and the 13 June 2025 stockpile figures are all drawn from the Agency's own 4 June 2026 reports, read through a specialist reproduction that quotes them directly because iaea.org returns HTTP 402 to automated retrieval. The grade applies to the Agency's reported position, which is the claim this record makes — not to any proposition about what Iran is currently doing, which is precisely what nobody can currently grade.Sources: IAEA Iran verification and NPT safeguards reporting · UN Security Council and Panel of Experts reporting↗ · Congressional Research Service — Iran, the Gulf and the Strait of HormuzMethodologyCorrectionsOpen in Explore

Last reviewed2026-09-04

Related structure

1 record that International Atomic Energy Agency — Iran safeguards names, or that name it. Every one is an explicit reference in a published record — nothing here is inferred from subject matter.

Relationships

Standing relationships whose record names this actor as a party, with the type, status and validity the record states.