VIENNA — Iran carried out secret nuclear activities with material not declared to the United Nations (UN) nuclear watchdog at three locations that have long been under investigation, the watchdog said in a wide-ranging, confidential report to member states seen by Reuters.

The findings in the “comprehensive” International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report requested by the agency’s 35-nation Board of Governors in November pave the way for a push by the United States, Britain, France and Germany for the board to declare Iran in violation of its non-proliferation obligations.

A resolution would infuriate Iran and could further complicate nuclear talks between Tehran and Washington.

Using the IAEA report’s findings, the four Western powers plan to submit a draft resolution for the board to adopt at its next meeting the week of June 9, diplomats say. It would be the first time in almost 20 years Iran has formally been found in non-compliance.

Iran’s foreign ministry and the Iranian nuclear agency rejected the report, calling it “politically motivated” in a joint statement. They said Tehran will take “appropriate measures” in response to any effort to take action against the country at the Board of Governors meeting, state media reported, without elaborating.

Tehran says it wants to master nuclear technology for peaceful purposes and has long denied accusations by Western powers that it is seeking to develop nuclear weapons.

While many of the findings relate to activities dating back decades and have been made before, the IAEA report’s conclusions were more definitive. It summarized developments in recent years and pointed more clearly towards coordinated, secret activities, some of which were relevant to producing nuclear weapons.

It also spelled out that Iran’s cooperation with IAEA continues to be “less than satisfactory” in “a number of respects.” The IAEA is still seeking explanations for uranium traces found years ago at two of four sites it has been investigating. Three hosted secret experiments, it found.

The IAEA has concluded that “these three locations, and other possible related locations, were part of an undeclared structured nuclear program carried out by Iran until the early 2000s and that some activities used undeclared nuclear material,” the report said.

Nuclear material and/or heavily contaminated equipment from that program was stored at the fourth site, Turquzabad, between 2009 and 2018, it said.

“The Agency concludes that Iran did not declare nuclear material and nuclear-related activities at three undeclared locations in Iran, specifically, Lavisan-Shian, Varamin, and Turquzabad,” the report said.

At Lavisan-Shian in Tehran, a disc made of uranium metal was “used in the production of explosively driven neutron sources” at least twice in 2003, a process designed to initiate the explosion in a nuclear weapon, the report said, adding that it was part of “small-scale” tests.

The report is likely to lead to Iran being referred to the UN Security Council, though that would probably happen at a later IAEA board meeting, diplomats said.

More immediately, it is likely to lead to Iran again accelerating or expanding its rapidly advancing nuclear program, as it has done after previous rebukes at the board. It could also further complicate talks with the United States aimed at reining in that program.

URANIUM ENRICHMENT
A separate IAEA report sent to member states on Saturday said Iran’s stock of uranium enriched to up to 60% purity, close to the roughly 90% of weapons grade, had grown by roughly half to 408.6 kilograms. That is enough, if enriched further, for nine nuclear weapons, according to an IAEA yardstick.

Both IAEA reports said enrichment to such a high level was “of serious concern” since it is the only country to do so without producing nuclear weapons.

Israel, which has long urged strong action against Iran’s nuclear program, said the IAEA report showed Tehran was determined to complete its nuclear weapons program. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the world should act now to stop Iran from doing this.

US intelligence agencies and the IAEA have long believed Iran had a secret, coordinated nuclear weapons program that it halted in 2003. Iran denies ever having had one.

Separately on Saturday, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said his Omani counterpart presented elements of a US proposal for a nuclear deal between Tehran and Washington during a short visit to Tehran.

In Washington, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said later on Saturday that President Donald J. Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff “has sent a detailed and acceptable proposal to the Iranian regime, and it’s in their best interest to accept it.”She declined to provide further details.

Mr. Araghchi said in a post on X that Iran “will respond to the US proposal in line with the principles, national interests and rights of people of Iran.”

His statement came ahead of an anticipated sixth round of talks between Washington and Tehran. The date and venue of talks have not yet been announced. — Reuters

JAKARTA — Indonesian authorities will continue searching on Sunday for eight people trapped in a rock collapse at a quarry in West Java, where the death toll has reached 17 with six injured, the search and rescue agency Basarnas said.

The toll, as reported by the victims’ families, is provisional, the agency said in a statement late on Saturday.

The site of Friday’s collapse in Cirebon is dangerous and “does not meet safety standards for workers”, West Java Governor Dedi Mulyadi posted on Instagram.

The Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry said in a statement it would investigate the cause of the collapse and conduct an assessment to identify any potential further landslides.

Cirebon Regency is prone to soil movement, especially when precipitation is above normal, while the area of the collapse has a cliff slope, the chief of the ministry’s geological agency, Muhammad Wafid, said in the statement.

Mr. Wafid said the undercutting method used in the open mining area and the steep slope may also have played a role in the collapse.

“While carrying out evacuation and search efforts, (rescuers) must pay attention to the weather and steep slopes, and not carry out activities during and after heavy rain, because this area still has the potential for further landslides that could hit or bury officers,” Mr. Wafid said. — Reuters

NEWBURYPORT, Massachusetts — By the time Robbie Roberge spotted the fire consuming his boat’s galley last August, he knew he had just minutes to evacuate his beloved Three Girls fishing vessel, named for his daughters.

As the flames spread up the boat’s walls, he helped his crew into safety suits, deployed a life raft and made a mayday call to alert nearby mariners and the US Coast Guard that he was abandoning ship more than 100 miles offshore.

Roberge, a commercial fisherman from South Portland, Maine, learned how to handle such an emergency just three months earlier at a workshop held by Fishing Partnership Support Services (FPSS), a nonprofit that has trained thousands of East Coast fishermen in safety practices.

On May 20, Roberge cut a fishing trip short to bring the six-man crew from his remaining boat, the Maria JoAnn, to another FPSS training in Newburyport, Massachusetts.

“I have years of experience, but not dealing with emergencies,” said Roberge, whose handling of the fire led to a successful rescue with no injuries. “I make it a point to be here.”

Such safety trainings — aimed at fishermen, loggers, farmers and other workers in America’s most dangerous jobs — could be scaled back or wound down entirely as soon as July, according to Reuters interviews with a dozen health and safety experts and organizations, as a result of President Donald J. Trump’s drive to slash the size and cost of the federal government.

Those cuts have fallen heavily on the federal government’s National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), an agency within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) that is a key funder of workplace safety training and research.

WINDING DOWN
The Trump administration on April 1 terminated about 875 of the roughly 1,000 employees at NIOSH, including most of the staff who provide technical advice and support to a dozen Centers for Agricultural Safety and Health focused on fishing, farming and logging workers.

Although Mr. Trump this month reinstated about 300 NIOSH employees, they do not include the office overseeing the centers, according to data compiled by government worker unions seen by Reuters.

Reuters spoke to staff at seven of the centers who described preparations to close down when their current funding cycles run out in the coming months.

J. Glenn Morris, director of the Southeastern Coastal Center for Agricultural Health and Safety at the University of Florida, said his team had already begun winding down work in anticipation of losing their NIOSH grant on Sept. 29.

“We’re shutting down the direct education to the workers, we’re shutting down the research,” he said.

NIOSH funding for the Alaska Marine Safety Education Association’s fishermen safety trainings could run out as soon as July 1, said Executive Director Leann Cyr.

FPSS also expects to lose NIOSH funding in September, potentially leading it to cut back on trainings, said Dan Orchard, the group’s executive vice-president.

The loss of the trainings could put more burden on federal marine rescue services when fishermen face emergencies at sea, said John Roberts, an FPSS instructor who spent 31 years in the Coast Guard doing search and rescue.

“The return on investment of the government is huge,” he said. “If they give us this money to do this training, it’s going to lessen how much money has to be spent to rescue the untrained.”

Asked to comment on the NIOSH job cuts, an HHS spokesperson said: “The work will continue. HHS supports America’s farmers, fishmen, and logging workers.”

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., said in March that the staff reductions are necessary to reduce bureaucracy and improve efficiency and that NIOSH would be combined with other sub-agencies into a new Administration for a Healthy America.

The scope of the impact on these centers and their potential closures have not been previously reported.

RISKY WORK
The nation’s 442,000 fishing, farming and logging workers make up just a fraction of America’s workforce, but they have the highest fatal injury rate of any US occupation — 24.4 per 100,000 workers in 2023 or seven times the national average, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

These workers do dangerous tasks from rural outposts where it might take hours to receive medical care. Fishermen risk falling overboard. Farmers and farmworkers could be crushed by equipment or contract bird flu. Loggers face chainsaws and falling limbs.

That fatality rate has decreased over the last 20 years, BLS data show, with advances in mechanization and tightening federal safety regulations.

Safety research and training supported by the centers have helped improve outcomes as well, said Matt Keifer, professor emeritus of occupational safety at the University of Washington, who has worked for two of the centers.

Reuters could not verify the total number of workers trained by all of the centers, but the Northeast Center for Occupational Health and Safety in Cooperstown, New York, trained more than 5,600 workers in 2024, said Director Julie Sorensen.

Some industry groups offer safety training without federal funding, like the Professional Logging Contractors (PLC) of the Northeast, which hosts 11 annual trainings on equipment and worksite safety, according to Executive Director Dana Doran.

In addition to worksite risks, the NIOSH-funded centers and programs often tackle mental health challenges, drug addiction and diet-related disease.

In the fishing sector, for instance, opiate addiction is a significant enough concern that fishermen at the FPSS training were taught to administer the overdose reversal drug Narcan.

Staff at the Great Plains Center for Agricultural Health at the University of Iowa have trained rural healthcare providers on risks farmers might face, like hearing loss from exposure to loud noises, said Director T. Renee Anthony.

Erika Scott, deputy director of the Northeast Center, set up mobile health clinics at logging sites with the PLC to research high rates of hypertension among the state’s 3,000 loggers.

It took years to convince loggers of the importance of public health research, said Mr. Doran.

“We’ve built that trust together. And that trust will potentially be lost,” Mr. Doran said.

‘LEFT BEHIND’
At the FPSS safety training, more than 50 fishing captains and crew learned to put out fires, make mayday calls, plug leaks, and deploy safety suits.

Attendees cheered each others’ efforts to light flares and use water pumps and traded stories of nightmarish near-misses on slippery decks or sinking boats.

For Al Cottone, a fourth-generation fisherman in Gloucester, Massachusetts, and a FPSS instructor, cuts to the trainings would be “tragic.”

In the decade he has been involved with FPSS, Mr. Cottone said the number of attendees at an average training has doubled to 40 to 50 from 20 to 25.

“There are so many people who are going to be left behind, because getting this in the private sector, this type of training, it costs a lot of money,” he said. — Reuters