The head of the UN's nuclear watchdog said yesterday that Iran has nearly completed the uranium enrichment plant at the centre of US accusations that Tehran wants to develop nuclear weapons and was working on another.
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) head Dr Mohamed ElBaradei did not respond to repeated US accusations that Iran's nuclear programme was intended to develop the capacity to build nuclear weapons in the text of his comments prepared for the board after an inspection trip to Iran last month.
"My colleagues and I were able to visit a number of facilities - including a gas centrifuge enrichment pilot plant at Natanz that is nearly ready for operation, and a much larger enrichment facility still under construction at the same site," Dr ElBaradei told the agency's board.
The same technology used to enrich uranium to make reactor fuel can be used to make the highly-enriched material required for a nuclear bomb, although Iran has said it only intends to make reactor fuel.
Dr ElBaradei reiterated his call to Iran to help dispel doubts about its nuclear ambitions by signing up to the IAEA's "Additional Protocol" which would allow inspectors freer access to Iran's nuclear sites with little prior warning.
Iran has unveiled details of an ambitious nuclear energy programme, from mining uranium ore to managing the spent fuel from atomic reactors.
It has said it wants to be generating 6,000 mw of electricity from atomic power plants by 2022 to meet the growing energy demand of its 65 million population. - (Reuters)