Iran on Monday vowed it would never suspend the sensitive process of uranium enrichment on domestic soil, saying it needed the fuel for a new nuclear power station it is building in the west of the country. The head of Iran's atomic energy organisation Gholam Reza Aghazadeh rejected the notion that the delivery of the first nuclear fuel from Russia to its nuclear power plant in Bushehr meant Iran did not require enrichment.
"We are building a 360 Megawatt nuclear reactor in Darkhoyen" in the western Khuzestan province, he told state television. Officials have in the past said that Iranian engineers had started work on a new 360 MW reactor to produce electricity but this was the first time its location had been revealed.
"The fuel for this power station must come from Natanz," the site of Iran's uranium enrichment plant, he said. "Several years will be required to build this power station and in parallel we need to develop the enrichment plant in Natanz, where we have currently 3,000 centrifuges," Aghazadeh added.