Michele Kearney's Nuclear Wire

Major Energy and Environmental News and Commentary affecting the Nuclear Industry.

Friday, September 25, 2009

Iran Informs IAEA of Clandestine Enrichment Site

Iran Informs IAEA of Clandestine Enrichment Site
Friday, Sept. 25, 2009

U.S. President Barack Obama, right, delivers a statement today on a newly disclosed Iranian enrichment facility. He is accompanied by British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, center, and French President Nicolas Sarkozy (Jim Watson/Getty Images).

Iran informed the International Atomic Energy Agency this week that it is constructing an underground uranium enrichment "pilot plant" at a site roughly 100 miles southwest of Tehran, the U.N. organization confirmed today (see GSN, Sept. 24).

The existence of the Qum enrichment site -- also confirmed to Iranian state media by an "informed source" -- is certain to heighten international suspicions that Iran's uranium enrichment program is intended to generate nuclear-weapon material.

In a Monday letter to the U.N. nuclear watchdog, Iran billed the facility as a research site that would only produce low-enriched uranium on an experimental basis, IAEA spokesman Marc Vidricaire said, according to Reuters.

See Full Article...
http://gsn.nti.org/gsn/nw_20090925_7624.php

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