UN Watchdog Confirms Nuclear Activity at Iran's Pickaxe Mountain Amid Rising Tensions

The UN’s nuclear watchdog has said that nuclear activity is taking place at Iran’s Pickaxe Mountain, a day after new satellite imagery showed a surge in construction activity at the site.

Analysis of satellite images at the heavily fortified site, which is believed to host two deeply buried tunnel complexes, and the nearby damaged Natanz uranium enrichment facility, suggests there has been active excavation.

The development threatens to bring further escalation between the US and Iran after Donald Trump recently warned the US would bomb the nuclear site.

Researchers from the Centre for Strategic and International Studies used six years of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) change detection with Sentinel-2 optical change detection and very-high-resolution (VHR) Airbus imagery from July 9, 2026, as well as a Satellogic image from August 9, 2026.

The images revealed that there was more road activity at Pickaxe Mountain in 2026 than at any point in the site’s history, suggesting the raising and hardening of the portal accesses, paving of the internal road network, reinforcement around access areas, they said.

It comes as the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN’s nuclear watchdog, told Bloomsberg on Thursday there was activity at Pickaxe Mountain.

Trump said at the midterm Republican convention on Wednesday that they would hit Iran “very hard” if the US found they’d been working on the nuclear site.

"We notice there's a little activity ‌at Pickaxe. I would advise Iran not to get cute because we will have to hit them very hard," ‌Trump said in a speech at the midterm Republican convention. He has been threatening strikes on Pickaxe Mountain since at least mid-July.

Fighting between Saudi Arabia and the Houthis in Yemen has also escalated in the past few days, a second theatre of war that threatens global energy supplies from the Middle East.

Houthi militants have taken control of the Yemeni Red Sea city of Mocha and are launching attacks on the strategic Red Sea islands of Hanish, the Yemeni sources told Reuters on Thursday.

Government forces and their allies are relocating south to Dhubab, which sits directly on the strait, across from the island of Perim. Control of Dhubab and the island is key to gaining hold of the strait, they said.