Iran has warned that it could enrich its uranium stockpile to 90 per cent purity — weapons grade– if attacked again by the United States or Israeli forces. The threat came amid media reports claiming US President Trump was considering fresh military action against the Islamic Republic as negotiations with the country remain deadlocked.
“One of Iran’s options in the event of another attack could be 90 per cent enrichment,” Iranian Parliamentary Commission spokesperson Ebrahim Rezaei said in a post on X
“We will review it in the parliament.”
یکی از گزینههای ایران در صورت حمله مجدد میتواند غنیسازی ۹۰ درصد باشد. در مجلس بررسی میکنیم.
— ابراهیم رضایی (@EbrahimRezaei14) May 12, 2026
Trump’s Uranium Problem
Trump has cited Iran’s “nuclear dust”, his term for the enriched uranium, as a key factor behind his war of choice against Tehran’s Islamic regime, which has now stretched for over 70 days. He has insisted that Tehran would not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons.
“We’re not going to let Iran have a nuclear weapon,” he has said. Earlier this week, he told journalists that the US was “closely monitoring” Iran’s stockpile, and Washington would know if anyone approached the site and would “blow them up”.
Trump on Monday also warned the ceasefire in the Middle East war was on “life support” after rejecting the latest counteroffer from Iran, which said its military stood ready to respond to any act of aggression.
The Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar with the matter, said Iran’s counterproposal had included the possibility of diluting some of its highly enriched uranium, with the rest being transferred to a third country for a while.
Iran’s Uranium Stockpile
In the past eight years, after Trump, during his first term as president, pulled Washington out of a nuclear deal with Tehran, Iran has accumulated 22,000 pounds, or 11000 kilograms, of enriched uranium, according to a New York Times report.
Iran started the uranium enrichment process in 2006 on an industrial scale, insisting its aim was peaceful. Reports from the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), showed the stockpile kept growing over the years. In 2010, Tehran announced it would begin enriching uranium up to 20 per cent– ostensibly to make fuel for a research reactor. This level is the official dividing line between civilian and military uses.
The UN watchdog believes that 440.9 kilograms (972 pounds) of Iran’s stockpile is enriched up to 60 per cent purity, a short, technical step from weapons-grade levels of 90 per cent.
Uranium’s enrichment becomes increasingly easy as concentrations rise. It’s much harder to get from zero per cent to 20 per cent than from 20 per cent to 60 per cent or even to 90 per cent — the preferred level for making nuclear arms.
In June 2021, Iran’s then president, Hassan Rouhani, had accepted that Tehran could enrich uranium up to 90 per cent if its nuclear reactors needed it but added it still sought the revival of a 2015 deal that would limit its atomic activities in return for a lifting of sanctions.
“Iran’s Atomic Energy Organisation can enrich uranium by 20 per cent and 60 per cent and if one day our reactor needs it, it can enrich uranium to 90 per cent purity,” Rouhani told a cabinet meeting, the semi-official Mehr news agency reported.
Where Is Iran’s Uranium
But the fate of the Iranian stockpile remains a mystery. The IAEA believes the majority of Iran’s uranium is likely still at its Isfahan nuclear complex, which was bombarded by airstrikes in June last year and faced less intense attacks in this year’s US-Israeli attacks.
Citing satellite images, IAEA chief Rafael Grossi earlier this week said the nuclear watchdog believes a large percentage of Iran’s highly enriched uranium “was stored there in June 2025 when the 12-day war broke out, and it has been there ever since”.
“We haven’t been able to inspect or to reject that the material is there and that the seals –the IAEA seals – remain there,” he said. “I hope we’ll be able to do that, so what I tell you is our best estimate.”