Posted on 04/23/2003 2:31:02 PM PDT by knighthawk
MOSCOW, April 22 (AFP) - Russia is concerned that Iran may be enriching uranium with a view to developing nuclear weapons, Atomic Energy Minister Alexander Rumyantsev said on Tuesday, quoted by the ITAR-TASS news agency.
Rumyantsev referred to US press reports that Tehran had equipped a nuclear complex with the capacity to enrich its recently-disclosed uranium deposits, sparking fears that the country may be stepping up a covert weapons program.
"Such centrifuges are capable of enriching uranium to a high enough concentration for developing weapons," he said. "If the media reports are accurate, the situation is alarming."
"Iran must acknowledge these activities and allow an inspection" by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)," he said.
Iran in February revealed that it was building an array of facilities to exploit uranium deposits which would make it self-sufficient in nuclear fuel.
IAEA inspectors were later shown a network of centrifuges designed to enrich uranium at a facility near the northwestern Iranian city of Natanz.
The US news magazine Time shortly afterwards quoted diplomatic sources as saying work on the Natanz plant was "extremely advanced" and involved "hundreds" of gas centrifuges ready to produce enriched uranium and "the parts for a thousand others ready for assembly".
Washington has branded Iran a "rogue state," charging that it had "a far more robust nuclear weapons development programme" than previously believed.
Russia has come under fire from the United States for helping construct the Bushehr nuclear reactor in southern Iran and promising to provide fuel for it.
Both Moscow and Tehran have denied that oil-rich Iran is engaged in a covert nuclear weapons programme, and have said Bushehr will provide nuclear energy for peaceful means.
Moscow last month turned the tables on Washington by charging that some of the United States' "closest allies" were supplying Iran with nuclear equipment.
"According to these press reports, this has been achieved thanks to technology from a US company," Rumyantsev reiterated.
"On the one hand the United States criticises Iran and Russia for cooperating in building a nuclear reactor, while on the other a US company is planning to build a powerful uranium enrichment factory," he charged.
Rumyantsev has claimed that centrifuge machines discovered in Iran were made by the Anglo-Dutch consortium Urenco, which provides uranium-enrichment services for nuclear power plants.
Urenco, which is due to take part in a US consortium building an enrichment plant in the United States, denied the claim.
Syria
Saudi Arabia
One of the African Countries
Pakistan
India
How about China or Russia? How come those countries didn't make your list?
"The failure of US policy makers to comprehend the veiled aggressiveness and hostility towards the United States inherent in Sino-Russian strategy and the belief that the political and economic reforms in Russia and the partial introduction of capitalism in China have foreshadowed these countries' development into real democracies, have eroded the effectiveness of US policies in the foreign affairs, defence, intelligence and counter-intelligence fields. US policymakers have recklessly accepted the premise that Russia and China are no longer their enemies, but are rather potential allies and partners fully deserving of US support. Only countries like Iran, Iraq and North Korea - which (ironically, in this context) work secretly with Russia and China - are still considered potential adversaries.
US policymakers should urgently re-examine their assumptions about the 'progress' of Russia and China 'towards democracy'. They should take account of Sino-Russian strategy and should recognize that the long-term strategic, political and economic threat comes from a Sino-Russian axis and associated participants like North Korea, Iran, Iraq and Syria. The Russian and Chinese leaders are still committed to their objective of world domination and believe that, disguised as 'democrats', in accordance with Leninist teaching, they will be able to achieve it..."
Maybe the worried one is getting ready to liberate the Iranians.
Anyone who's been keeping up with Bill Gertz on the Russia-Iran affair knows the Russians have been giving Iran whatever is lying about.
While Strobe Talbott was counseling patience with Russia, Russia was illegally doling out missile technology to the radical Muslim regime in Iran. Betrayal, p. 171.
There follows a chapter detailing Clinton's derelection of duty in allowing Russia to provide Iran with technology to build nuclear-capable missiles threatening Israel and U.S. forces on the peninsula.
A report March 4 indicates Iran well on way to enrichment:
Iran Uranium Facility Seen Onstream in Few Weeks
By REUTERS
March 4, 2003
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-iran-nuclear.html
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran expects to bring onstream in the next few weeks a uranium processing plant which Washington fears could be part of a secret program to develop nuclear weapons, newspapers reported on Tuesday.
``Iran will start operating its nuclear facility in Isfahan early next (Iranian) year,'' Hassan Rohani, secretary-general of the National Supreme Security Council, was quoted as saying in several papers.
The Iranian calendar year starts on March 21.
The Isfahan plant in central Iran would process uranium from nearby mines. The resulting gas would then be enriched at another facility in the town of Natanz, Rohani said.
Iran has firmly denied the U.S. charges about its atomic energy program, arguing its nuclear program will be used only for peaceful purposes.
The Islamic Republic has said it wants to generate 6,000 MW of electricity from atomic power plants by 2022 to meet the growing energy demand of its 65 million population.
However U.S. officials say Iran's extensive oil and gas deposits make an expensive nuclear power program unnecessary.
Iran, which Washington has branded an ``axis of evil'' member along with Iraq and North Korea, last month unveiled details of an ambitious nuclear energy program, from mining uranium ore to managing the spent fuel from atomic reactors.
``Having access to the technology is not translated into having access to an atomic bomb. It is scientific technology used for peaceful purposes,'' Rohani said.
The head of U.N. nuclear watchdog Mohamed ElBaradei has said Iran could only dispel doubts about its nuclear ambitions by signing up to the International Atomic Energy Agency's ``Additional Protocol'' which would allow inspectors freer access to nuclear sites with little prior warning.
Last month ElBaradei visited the gas centrifuge enrichment plant at Natanz, about 320 km (200 miles) south of Tehran, and reported seeing a sophisticated facility with a pilot project and a larger unit still under construction. Part of the facility was being built underground.
Uranium must be enriched before it can be used in nuclear reactors to generate electricity. But highly enriched uranium is also a key ingredient for nuclear weapons.
Independent experts say Iran is at least two years away from producing enriched uranium.
Construction of the Natanz plant and a heavy water plant in the nearby town of Arak was first publicly disclosed by an Iranian opposition group. That led ElBaradei to push Iranian officials for an assurance they would in future inform the IAEA of any new nuclear facilities as soon as the decision to build them has been taken.
Rohani said investment in nuclear technology ``will help boost our national prowess.''
``Nuclear technology is such a complicated technology on which Iran has capitalized in the last two years. We have managed to reach out for the technology to produce enriched uranium,'' he was quoted as saying.
Iran's first nuclear reactor, the 1000 MW Bushehr plant being built with Russian help in southern Iran, is due to become operational by early 2004.
Or maybe they did, but the check bounced and now they won't pay up.......
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