“The [construction of the] final production line of these centrifuges has concluded and the earlier generations of these centrifuges that have a low efficiency will soon be phased out,” Abbasi said.
On February 23, Iran said more than 180 second-generation centrifuges had been put in place at its Natanz nuclear facility, and that more 180 IR2M centrifuges would gradually be installed there.
The Iranian private sector has successfully designed 360-megawatt nuclear power reactors, Abbasi said on Sunday, adding, “We are ready to cooperate with foreign parties in the construction of power reactors and so far we have had proposals from Russia and some Western countries in this regard.”
The AEOI chief also said that Iran will announce other new achievements in the future as “political backup” in the next rounds of talks with the P5+1 group of world powers.
Iran and the P5+1 (Britain, China, France, Russia, and the United States plus Germany) wrapped up their latest talks in Almaty, Kazakhstan, on February 27. Both sides have held several meetings mainly over Tehran’s nuclear energy program.
Iran and the P5+1 agreed to convene in Almaty again on April 5-6 for the next round of the negotiations after holding expert-level talks in the Turkish city of Istanbul on March 17-18.
“Our political team should head into the March negotiations with specialized backup and we have enough achievements in this regard,” Abbasi noted.
Iran’s positions in the negotiations are clear, he said, adding, “Iran wants the nation’s nuclear rights to be observed and that no commitment more than those included in signed treaties be demanded of us.”
The US, Israel, and some of their allies have repeatedly accused Iran of pursuing non-civilian objectives in its nuclear energy program.
Iran rejects the allegation, arguing that, as a committed signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), it is entitled to develop nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.
In addition, the IAEA has conducted numerous inspections of Iran's nuclear facilities but has never found any evidence showing that the Iranian nuclear program has been diverted toward non-civilian objectives.
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