No Halt to Iran’s Enrichment R&D: Source
ILNA: A source close to Iran’s team of nuclear negotiators rejected reports that the country might refrain from testing new models of centrifuge machines used to enrich uranium, stressing that research and development activities in the enrichment field are firmly in place in Iran.
“The process of research and development in(uranium) enrichment(activities) is underway routinely and normally in the Atomic Energy Organization(of Iran), ” the source said on Saturday, dismissing as “untrue” the reports on a halt to the testing of new centrifuges.
Back on Thursday, Reuters cited US experts with knowledge of the nuclear talks between Tehran and six world powers as saying that Iran will refrain from testing new centrifuges under an extended nuclear agreement with the Group ۵ + ۱(Russia, China, the US, Britain, France and Germany).
In November and after a week of intensive negotiations in Vienna, diplomats from Iran and the six nations decided to extend talks on Tehran’s peaceful nuclear program for more seven months in the hope of clinching a final deal that would end a decade of impasse over Tehran’s peaceful nuclear energy program.
Elsewhere, the Iranian source noted that inspection of the country’s nuclear facilities is exclusively within the purview of the International Atomic Energy Agency(IAEA).
“The frequency and type of inspections of our country’s nuclear activities is a subject that, like the past, is coordinated between Iran and the Agency, and the other parties have no role in that issue, ” the source explained, adding that inspections are being carried out by the UN watchdog in a normal manner as in the past.
The source also made it clear that Iran will continue turning uranium oxide into nuclear fuel plates as scheduled, saying the rate of conversion will decline in the coming months.
“Conversion of the(uranium) oxide into fuel plates takes place according to the plans previously devised by our country’s Atomic Energy Organization(AEOI), and its amount will even drop in the coming months compared to the previous months. ”