Rafael Grossi, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said in Japan on Wednesday 24 June that inspections of Iran's enrichment sites are "going to happen" and that the agency would work on "the modalities, dates, procedures, places, very soon"1. The IAEA is the UN nuclear watchdog that verifies what states hold; it has been locked out of Iran for more than 100 days, with 440.9 kilograms of 60 per cent enriched uranium unverified since February. Grossi moved from whether to how, his firmest language since the Islamabad memorandum, though he named no date.
Iran answered in the opposite direction the same day. Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi said access would follow only a final deal and practical sanctions relief, not precede them2. That contradicts the recitals of OFAC's General License X, which assumed IAEA access, and follows spokesman Esmail Baghaei's flat refusal on 23 June. The civilian government cannot concede the point, because the inspection block is an IRGC deterrent posture, not a negotiating chip the foreign ministry controls.
Then the claims widened. Donald Trump, the US President, told Fox News on Thursday that US inspectors would join the IAEA mission and that Iran had "completely agreed" to inspections3. Iran's foreign ministry denied any such agreement within hours, the identical sequence to his 23 June claim and Baghaei's denial. No instrument backs the assertion. OFAC's only 24 June action was Russia-related removals4, and The White House logged a single Senate nomination5; no Iran instrument has followed General License X. The strongest signal in the file is the absence of any signed paper to settle which of the three accounts is true.
