US Attacks Impact On Iran's Nuclear Facilities On Fordow But Its Clarity Is Not Yet Known

JAKARTA - The US attack on Iran's nuclear facilities at Fordow is said to have an impact, although there has been no further clarity or level of damage.

Head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Rafael Grossi said there was an impact from the US attack, but did not know the extent of the damage.

"There are clear indications of the impact, but for an underground damage rate assessment, we cannot give our own statements," he told CNN as quoted by The Times of Israel June 23.

"No one can tell you how severe the damage is," he continued.

President Donald Trump said the US had completed a "very successful attack" on three nuclear facility points in Iran, Saturday, June 21.

In an upload on Truth Social, President Trump stated that all US aircraft had come out of Iran's airspace, amid rising tensions in the Middle East.

Fordow, Grossi said, would not be damaged by power outages because it had an internal emergency power source.

Meanwhile, commercial satellite imagery suggests the US attack on the Fordow nuclear plant in Iran has seriously damaged - and possibly destroyed - a deep buried location and a uranium enrichment centrifuge in it, but there has been no confirmation, experts said on Sunday.

"They have just holed him with this MOP," said David totaling, a former UN nuclear inspector who heads the Institute of International Science and Security, referring to the massive Ordnance Penetrator bunker destroyer that the US says has taken down.

"I think the facility may have been destroyed," he added.

However, confirmation of underground damage cannot be ascertained, said Maria Eveleth, an associate researcher at CNA Corporation who specializes in satellite imagery.

The hall contains hundreds of centrifuges "too deep buried for us to evaluate the extent of damage based on satellite imagery," he said.

To defend against attacks such as those carried out by US troops on Sunday morning, Iran buried most of its nuclear programs in fortified locations deep underground, including on the side of the mountain on Fordow.

Satellite imagery shows six holes where the bunker-destroying bomb appears to have penetrated the mountain, and then the apparent soil is disrupted and covered in dust.

Some experts have also warned that Iran may have moved supplies of highly enriched uranium to levels close to weapons from Fordow prior to the US attack and could hide it and other nuclear components in unknown locations by Israel, the US, and the UN nuclear inspector.

They recorded satellite imagery from Maxar Technologies showing "unusual activity" at Fordow on Thursday and Friday, with long queues of vehicles waiting outside the facility's entrance.

Separately, Grossi said the facility on the ground of Natanz had been "torely destroyed," while its underground hall was "deeply suffering" from a power outage due to an Israeli attack.

The Isfahan site also suffered "very significant damage," Grossi said.

The United States and Israel previously said they intended to stop Tehran's nuclear program.

However, failure to destroy all of its facilities and equipment could mean Iran could easily restart weapons programs that US intelligence and the UN International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said had closed in 2003.

Grossi stressed that the IAEA "does not have elements that can prove that Iran has plans to make nuclear weapons."