‘Game is not over': Says Iran as US, Israel hunt for near-weapons grade uranium

Hans India

4 hours ago

Tehran: Iran still has stocks of enriched uranium - which is used to make nuclear weapons - and 'the game is not over', sources close to Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Tuesday. The location of a stockpile of 400kg of the material - enough to make up to 10 nuclear weapons - is unknown after the United States' weekend bombing of three Iranian facilities.
The 'missing' uranium is 60 per cent enriched. At 90, it can be used in nuclear weapons.
Satellite photos and sources indicate that Iran most likely moved the uranium, and possibly some equipment to continue enrichment, to a secret location days before American B-2 'Spirit' bombers dropped 'bunker busters' on Fordrow, Natanz, and Isfahan, causing significant damage and destruction.
Shortly after the attack, red flags were raised about the location of the uranium, with US Vice President JD Vance and senior officials privately admitting they do not know, at this time, where it is.
After the US strike, Iran said it had taken "necessary measures" to ensure the programme continues. "We have taken necessary measures and are taking stock of the damage caused by the strikes," Mohd Eslami, chief of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, said in a statement aired on state television.
"Plans for restarting (the facilities) have been prepared in advance," he said, underlining Tehran's determination to continue despite US threats, "... our strategy is to ensure production is not disrupted."
Israeli and US intel believes the material - packed in special crates, each small enough to fit in the boot of a car- was loaded on to trucks and taken to another underground site, possibly near Isfahan. Two Israeli officials, who asked not to be named, admitted this was likely what happened.