Iran said on Saturday that it plans to enrich uranium by up to 20% at its underground nuclear facility in Fordo “as soon as possible”, pushing its program a technical step away from weapon levels as it increases pressure on the West over the ragged. atomic agreement.
The move comes amid mounting tensions between Iran and the U.S. in the final days of President Donald Trump’s government, which unilaterally withdrew the United States from the Tehran nuclear deal in 2018.
This sparked a growing series of incidents culminating in an attack by US drones that killed a top Iranian general in Baghdad a year ago, a birthday that comes on Sunday and that now has American officials concerned about possible Iran retaliation.
Iran’s decision to start enriching to 20% a decade ago almost brought an Israeli attack on its nuclear facilities, tensions that only eased with the 2015 atomic deal. A resumption of 20% enrichment could bring a return to temerity.
Even Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of the United States-educated Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, offered a military analogy to describe his agency’s readiness to take the next step.
“We are like soldiers and our fingers are on the trigger,” Salehi told Iranian state television. “The commander must command and we shoot. We are ready for this and we will produce (20% enriched uranium) as soon as possible ”.
Iran’s decision comes after its parliament passed a bill, later approved by a constitutional body, with the aim of increasing enrichment to pressure Europe to provide relief from sanctions. It also serves as pressure before the inauguration of US President-elect Joe Biden, who said he was willing to enter the nuclear deal again.
The International Atomic Energy Agency acknowledged that Iran informed its inspectors of the decision by letter after news leaked Friday night.
“Iran informed the agency that, in order to comply with a legal act recently approved by the country’s parliament, the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran intends to produce low-enriched uranium … up to 20 percent at the Fordo Fuel Enrichment Plant.” the IAEA said in a statement.
The IAEA added that Iran did not say when it plans to increase enrichment, although the agency “has inspectors present in Iran 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and they have regular access to Fordo”. The parliamentary bill also asked Iran to expel these inspectors, although it appears that Tehran has not yet decided to take this step.
Salehi said Iran would need to exchange the natural uranium in centrifuges in Fordo for material already enriched at 4% to start the process of going to 20%.
“This must be done under the supervision of the IAEA,” Salehi added.
Since the collapse of the deal, Iran has resumed enrichment in Fordo, near the holy Shi’ite city of Qom, some 90 kilometers (55 miles) southwest of Tehran.
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Protected by the mountains, Fordo is surrounded by anti-aircraft guns and other fortifications. It is the size of a football field, large enough to house 3,000 centrifuges, but small and strong enough to make American officials suspect it had a military purpose when they publicly exposed the site in 2009.
The 2015 agreement saw Iran agree to limit its enrichment in exchange for sanctions. The agreement also provided for Fordo to become a research and development unit.
Under Iran’s former hardline president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Tehran has begun to enrich 20%. Israel, which has its own undeclared nuclear weapons program, feared that Tehran was building a bomb.
After Fordo’s discovery, the United States worked on so-called “bunker-destroying” bombs, designed to attack these facilities. While Israel threatened to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities like Fordo, American officials reportedly showed them a video of a bunker-destroying bomb destroying a Fordo model in the southwestern desert of the United States.
Israel, who, under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, continued to criticize Iran’s nuclear program, made no immediate comment on Saturday.
As of now, Iran is enriching uranium by up to 4.5%, violating the agreement’s 3.67% limit. Experts say Iran now has enough low-enriched uranium stored for at least two nuclear weapons if it chooses to pursue them. Iran has long maintained its peaceful nuclear program.
Iran separately started construction on a new site in Fordo, according to satellite photos obtained by The Associated Press in December.
Iran’s announcement coincides with the anniversary of the U.S. drone hitting General Qassem Soleimani of the Revolutionary Guard in Baghdad last year. That attack later saw Iran retaliate by launching a ballistic missile attack, injuring dozens of US soldiers in Iraq. Tehran also accidentally shot down a Ukrainian passenger jet that night, killing all 176 people on board.
As the anniversary approached, the United States sent B-52 bombers flying over the region and sent a nuclear-powered submarine to the Persian Gulf.
On Thursday, sailors discovered a lapa mine on a tanker in the Persian Gulf, near the Iran border, near the Iran border, while preparing to transfer fuel to another company-owned tanker. traded on the New York Stock Exchange. No one has taken responsibility for mining, although it comes after a series of similar attacks in 2019 that the U.S. Navy attributed to Iran. Tehran denied being involved.
In November, an Iranian scientist who founded the country’s military nuclear program two decades earlier was killed in an attack that Tehran attributes to Israel.