Tehran takes new step toward building a nuclear weapon
JCPOA breached again as Iran’s atomic chief boasts of high-powered uranium centrifuges
Iran on Saturday activated at least 40 high-powered uranium centrifuges in the most serious breach so far of its commitments under the 2015 deal to curb its nuclear program.
Nuclear chief Behrouz Kamalvandi said Iran had begun using an array of 20 IR-6 centrifuges and another of 20 IR-4 centrifuges. An IR-6 can produce enriched uranium 10 times as fast as an IR-1, and an IR-4 five times as fast.
The nuclear deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), limited Iran to using only 5,060 first-generation IR-1 centrifuges to enrich uranium. By activating the 3.67 percent allowed under the deal, and it has gone beyond its 300kg limit for low-enriched uranium. The staged breaches of the JCPOA are widely viewed as a form of nuclear blackmail, to pressure European signatories to the deal to find a way for Iran to avoid US sanctions. “If Europeans want to make any decision, they should do it soon,” Kamalvandi said on Saturday. “Our plan is that if the other parties act on their commitments, we too return to our commitments.”
The UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency said it was aware of Iran’s announcement and “agency inspectors are on the ground in Iran and they will report any relevant activities to IAEA headquarters in Vienna.”
The acting head of the IAEA, Cornel Feruta, is expected in Tehran on Sunday for talks with nuclear chiefs and Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif. Meanwhile the Iranian oil tanker Adrian Darya 1 was anchored off Tartus on the Syrian coast on Saturday despite pledges by Tehran that its oil would not go there.
“Anyone who said the Adrian Darya 1 wasn’t headed to Syria is in denial,” US national security adviser John Bolton said. “We can talk, but Iran’s not getting any sanctions relief until it stops lying and spreading terror.”