Berlin, 29 June 2025 (dpa/MIA) – Tehran could resume enriching uranium within months despite claims by US President Donald Trump that the Iranian nuclear programme has been set back by years, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) head Rafael Grossi has told US broadcaster CBS News.

"The capacities they have are there. They can have - in a matter of months, I would say - a few cascades of centrifuges spinning and producing enriched uranium," Grossi said, in an interview set to be broadcast on Sunday.

The extent of damage caused by last week's US strikes on three Iranian nuclear facilities remains unclear.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has told Iranian state broadcaster IRIB that the attacks caused "significant" damage to the country's nuclear infrastructure.

Trump, meanwhile, has maintained that the US bombing raids set Iran's nuclear weapons programme back by years.

But in the interview, which was recorded on Friday, Grossi told CBS that "frankly speaking, one cannot claim that everything has disappeared and there is nothing there."

He said the IAEA was primarily interested in locating enriched uranium in Iran, saying that the agency had for years been asking why it had found traces of enriched uranium in various places.

"And we were simply not getting credible answers. If there was material - where is this material? So there could be even more. We don't know," he said.

The IAEA has reported that Tehran has 400 kilograms of uranium enriched to 60%, just a few steps away from the 90% needed for a bomb and well above the level needed for civilian purposes.

While Tehran has insisted it is not aiming for a nuclear weapon, the enrichment levels and the country's missile programme have raised international concerns.

Reacting to the air attacks by Israel and the United States this month, the Iranian parliament recently voted to suspend cooperation with the IAEA until "the security of nuclear facilities is guaranteed."