The Islamic regime's nuclear program grows

The Associated Press

TEHRAN, Iran | Iran announced Wednesday it now has 5,000 centrifuges operating and enriching uranium, the country’s latest defiance of U.N. demands to halt its controversial nuclear program.

Vice President Gholam Reza Aghazadeh said Iran will continue to install more centrifuges and enrich uranium to produce nuclear fuel for future Iranian nuclear power plants. In August, Iran said it had 4,000 centrifuges running at its plant in the central city of Natanz.

“At this point, more than 5,000 centrifuges are operating in Natanz and enriching uranium,” said Aghazadeh, who is head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran. He spoke to reporters during an exhibition of Iranian nuclear achievements at Tehran University.

Uranium enriched to a low level is used to produce nuclear fuel, but further enrichment makes it suitable for use in nuclear weapons.

Flaunting Iran’s defiance of international demands, Aghazadeh said the Islamic republic will never suspend enrichment.

“Suspension has not been defined in our lexicon,” he said.

The U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, said in a report last month that Iran was installing, or preparing to install, thousands more of the machines that spin uranium gas to enrich it — with the target of 9,000 centrifuges by next year.

IAEA officials could not be immediately reached for comment Wednesday, but Iran has said it plans to move toward large-scale uranium enrichment that will ultimately involve 54,000 centrifuges.

Former U.N. nuclear inspector David Albright said the additional centrifuges announced Wednesday were expected.

“Expect another 1,000 to start enriching soon,” said Albright, president for the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security. “As Iran runs centrifuges more and more, it’s just going to get better at it.”

Earlier this month, the IAEA estimated Iran had about 1,400 pounds of low-enriched uranium. U.N. officials have said Tehran would have to produce a little more than twice that to begin enriching it to the level needed to produce a nuclear weapon.

The United States and some of its allies accuse Iran of seeking to build nuclear weapons, and the U.N. Security Council has imposed three rounds of sanctions on Iran for its refusal to freeze its uranium enrichment program.

But Tehran denies it is trying to build bombs and insists it has the right under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty to enrich uranium and produce reactor fuel.