According to a report published by Student News Network news agency, Tehran has informed the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of its decision in a letter sent to the United Nations’ atomic watchdog.

It described the move to enrich uranium up to 60% purity as a strong message to the recent anti-Iran resolution passed by IAEA’s Board of Governors.

Iran’s other action included installation of two new IR2M and IR4 cascades at Natanz and Fardow facilities, which have now reached the stage prior to the injection of uranium gas into centrifuges. This means that Iran has practically imitated uranium enrichment by means of the new cascades, and the process will finish within the next few days.

Moreover, Iran has fitted and launched new centrifuges at two empty halls in Fardow and Natanz nuclear sites, in what is deemed as a decisive response to the resolution against the country.

The halls, under Iran’s commitment to the terms of the landmark 2015 nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), had been vacant, but centrifuges have been installed there once again.

The report went on to point to the replacement of IR1 centrifuges at Fordow nuclear facility with IR6 as Iran’s fourth important move against the IAEA resolution, stressing that the measure will increase enrichment at the site by 10 times.

The latest measures are said to be in line with a law approved by the Iranian Parliament to counter unilateral sanctions imposed by the United States, the European Union and the IAEA on Tehran to their full extent.

In December 2020, the Iranian Parliament passed a law – dubbed the Strategic Action Plan to Counter Sanctions – that prompted the Iranian administration to restrict the IAEA’s inspections and accelerate the development of the country’s nuclear program beyond the limits set by the JCPOA.

Iran took five steps in scaling back its obligations, among them abandoning operational limitations on its nuclear industry, including with regard to the capacity and level of uranium enrichment.

All those measures were adopted after informing the IAEA beforehand, with the Agency’s inspectors present on the ground in Iran.

The recent anti-Iran resolution at the UN nuclear agency’s Board of Governors, ratified on Thursday, has criticized Iran for what it called a lack of cooperation with the agency. It was put forward by the United States, Britain, France and Germany, in continuation of their political pressures on Iran. Russia and China voted against the motion.

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“We regret the decision of the United States, following Iran’s Fordow site and resumption of uranium enrichment, to terminate an exemption that would facilitate the conduct of civilian projects on this site,” French foreign ministry spokeswoman Agnes von der Muhll told reporters in an online briefing, AFP reported.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Monday that Washington would no longer waive sanctions related to Iran’s Fordow nuclear plant.

“President (Hassan) Rouhani recently announced that Iran will begin uranium enrichment activities at the Fordow facility. Therefore, the United States will terminate the sanctions waiver related to the nuclear facility at Fordow, effective December 15th, 2019,” Pompeo told reporters on Monday, Reuters reported.

The US State Department had said last month that it renewed waivers for 90 days.

Kelsey Davenport, director of the Arms Control Association, said the decision could further jeopardize the 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

“This step further risks collapsing the JCPOA because it removes a tangible benefit to Iran under the deal,” Davenport said.

The French spokeswoman further said, “Iran’s resumption of enrichment activities at the Fordow site, with potentially serious proliferation consequences, is a new step that marks a regrettable acceleration of Iran’s withdrawal from the Vienna agreement.”

In May 2018, US President Donald Trump pulled his country out of the JCPOA.

Iran and the remaining parties launched talks to save the JCPOA after the US withdrawal, but the three EU parties to the deal (France, Britain, and Germany) have failed to ensure Iran’s economic interests.

The EU’s inaction forced Tehran to stop honoring certain commitments to the nuclear deal, including a rise in the stockpile of enriched uranium.

Iran maintains that the new measures are not designed to harm the JCPOA but to save the accord by creating a balance in the commitments.

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TEHRAN (Iran News) – Director of Fordow nuclear power plant said the facility is ready for 20% uranium enrichment when the need arises, adding that the enrichment machines are active and some more will come on stream in the near future.

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Mogherini expresses concern about nuclear activities in Fordow

According To Iran News, Iran’s resume of uranium enrichment on Fordow is a major concern for us, European Union Foreign Policy chief Federica Mogherini said in a press conference on Monday.

“We always rely on the IAEA for verification,” she said, “IAEA inspectors were on the site in the recent days.”

“We expected their report later to today so would see our relation toward that later today,” she added.

“Full commitment [to JCPOA] remain crucial for our security eve if it is increasingly difficult to preserve it,” she stressed, “we will continue our effort to have a full implementation of the agreement.”

European Union foreign ministers on Monday debated ways to keep the Iran nuclear deal intact after the Islamic Republic began enrichment work at its Fordow site.

At talks in Brussels, the EU powers that signed the 2015 Iran nuclear deal — Britain, France and Germany — were expected to signal what action should be taken as the bloc awaits a new report from the International Atomic Energy Agency later Monday on whether Iran is still complying with its commitments.

The Head of Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Ali Akbar Salehi said on Monday that the country is now producing more low-enriched uranium daily, after restarting an underground lab.

Salehi told AP journalists in Tehran that the country is now producing at least 5.5 kilograms daily (12 pounds). That’s compared to what Tehran had been producing — about 450 grams (1 pound) of low-enriched uranium per day.

Salehi said that’s due in part to restarting enrichment at Iran’s underground Fordo nuclear facility.

“I believe (that) in total, 5.5 kilograms is the daily volume of uranium enrichment in Natanz and Fordo,” Salehi told the AP, mentioning Iran’s other nuclear facility at Natanz.

The AEOI announced on November 6 that it had officially started injecting gas into 1,044 centrifuges at the underground Fordow nuclear plant in the fourth step of reducing commitments to the 2015 nuclear deal. The 2015 nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), allowed the first-generation IR-1 centrifuges at Fordow to spin without uranium gas.

Noting that the European and American politicians have reacted to Tehran’s latest move and are concerned, the AEOI head said Iran’s potentials have become active now.

Iran began reducing commitments to the JCPOA a year after the US’ unilateral withdrawal from the agreement and lack of any practical measures from the the European sides to safeguard Iran’s economic interests in the face of US sanctions.

The country stresses that all suspended measures will be resumed as soon as other parties to the agreement start to live up to their own commitments.

Salehi announced on Sunday, during the ceremony to start laying the concrete foundations of the second unit of Bushehr nuclear power plant, that Iran will produce up to 3,000 megawatts of nuclear electricity by 2027, which will avert emission of 21 million tons of pollutant gases.

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TEHRAN (Iran News) – Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif says while Iran has taken the next step to further reduce its commitments under the 2015 nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the door to negotiations to salvage the deal is still open.

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Hamid Baeidinejad told a group of UK mainstream media representatives on Thursday that Tehran’s move this week to inject gas into centrifuges at its Fordo plant was “adopted as a warning to the other sides and the international community that we are at a crisis.” Iran News quotes the report.

A member of Iran’s nuclear-negotiating team during the marathon talks that culminated in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), Baeidinejad said Iran will continue to increase its nuclear activity every two months unless it receives the economic benefits it was promised when it signed the nuclear deal with world powers.

“We hope this warning would encourage all other parties to implement their commitments. … Now it depends on the other side — if they don’t take this warning seriously … we will be in a very difficult situation,” he warned.

The nuclear deal was reached in Vienna in July 2015 between Iran and the US, Britain, France, Germany Russia, and China. It lifted nuclear-related sanctions against Tehran, which in turn changed some aspects of its nuclear program.

The US, however, left the accord last May and reinstated its unilateral sanctions against Iran. The European deal partners, meanwhile, have bowed to Washington’s pressure, failing to honor their contractual obligations to protect Iran’s economy in the face of America’s “toughest-ever” sanctions.

In his Thursday comments, the Iranian ambassador dismissed European arguments that it is difficult for them to circumvent the US sanctions.

“They have made commitments that are defined in very clear terms and they should be able to implement those commitments,” Baeidinejad said.

In reaction to Washington’s withdrawal from the deal and Europe’s inaction, Iran’s nuclear commitment cuts with the JCPOA happened in four phases, the latest of which was the resumption of enrichment at the Fordo nuclear facility near Tehran.

The fourth step of Iran’s nuclear commitment cuts, the injection of uranium hexafluoride (UF6) gas into centrifuges at Fordo, is believed to be the most important step so far, and a serious warning to other parties.

Enrichment capacity to go up

The spokesman of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) said with the new centrifuges installed, Iran’s enrichment capacity is to reach the level it was before signing the agreement.

Speaking in an interview on Thursday, Behrouz Kamalvandi said, “With the new machines, which have been installed after taking the third step [to reduce Iran’s commitments under the deal], 2,600 SWU (separative work units) have been added to the country’s enrichment capacity.”

“A total of 15 new machines were installed after the third step, which increased our total nuclear production capacity to 2,600 SWU. Today, the work at Fordo has been finished and four more cascades will be added… to increase our total capacity by about 700 SWU. When the work is totally done, our overall [enrichment] capacity will stand at about 9,500 SWU, which is the level we held before signing the JCPOA,” Kamalvandi added.

“Of course, our pre-JCPOA [enrichment] capacity was 1,000 SWU more [than this]. But the difference is that we have many advanced machines at our disposal. The farther we go, the more we can harvest from these machines. Also, the knowledge that we receive will help us enhance the quality and functionality of the machines,” he said.

Following a meeting on Thursday to discuss Iran’s latest nuclear measures, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) issued a statement via its spokesman, confirming that Iran has moved a cylinder of uranium hexafluoride gas to its Fordo site and connected it to centrifuges there.

The statement added that the UF6 gas cylinder was connected to two cascades of centrifuges for passivation, which it said was “a preparatory activity conducted prior to enrichment.”

A more detailed IAEA report sent to member states said the other four cascades of centrifuges installed at Fordo “remained unchanged.”

Mohammad Saeidi, a former AEOI deputy, said Tehran has even more important measures to take if other parties fail to fulfill their commitments.

“I believe that in case of other signatories’ failure to live up to their commitments, we have other very important measures which they will witness when the time for the next steps arrives,” he told Tabnak news website, stressing that the next steps would be more important than the fourth one.

“If the nuclear issue of Iran matters to Europeans, they must make their decision whether they want to preserve the accord or they really want to leave it and not fulfill their commitments,” he added.

Europe obligations

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov expressed concern about Tehran’s announcements but said European powers should do their part.

“They are demanding that Iran fulfill all (obligations) without exception but are not giving anything in return,” he told reporters in Moscow.

The Kremlin has previously called sanctions against Iran “unprecedented and illegal.”

French President Emmanuel Macron said Iran had made “grave” decisions and its resumption of uranium enrichment was a “profound change” from Tehran’s previous position.

The next few weeks will be dedicated to increasing pressure on Iran to return within the framework of the pact, the French president said during a trip to Beijing, adding that this must be “accompanied by an easing of some sanctions.”

“A return to normal can only take place if the United States and Iran agree to reopen a sort of trust agenda” and dialogue, Macron said, adding that he would discuss the issue with US President Donald Trump.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Europe has not yet taken a decision on how to respond to Iran’s decision to resume enriching uranium but every step Tehran takes makes things more difficult.

“We have not yet taken a final decision,” Merkel told a joint news conference in Berlin with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg. “But with each step, Iran takes the situation naturally gets more difficult.”

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Thursday called for “serious steps” to be taken against Iran after the Islamic Republic resumed uranium enrichment at Fordo.

“Iran’s expansion of proliferation-sensitive activities raises concerns that Iran is positioning itself to have the option of a rapid nuclear breakout,” Pompeo said in a statement, urging serious steps to be taken to increase pressure on Tehran.

Security of nuclear facilities

Meanwhile, Iran’s ambassador to the IAEA said Thursday he communicated Tehran’s concerns about the security of the country’s nuclear facilities to the agency, especially with regard to an IAEA inspector who was prevented from entering an Iranian nuclear site for carrying “suspicious” materials.

Kazem Gharibabadi said following an extraordinary meeting of the Board of Governors of the IAEA that he had offered a lengthy report on this issue to IAEA’s board, detailing everything that happened from the entry of the aforesaid inspector to Iran until the time she left the country.

“I emphasized that Iran has security concerns in this regard and does not intend to violate the immunity of IAEA’s inspectors, because we have not violated their rights and are aware of the stipulations of international law and our commitments.”

Iran’s IAEA envoy noted that detectors at Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility had issued alarms with regard to this inspector, showing that she was carrying dangerous materials, saying, “Various measures were taken later and detectors were used at various locations, giving the same result, even when they were applied to her handbag.”

Noting that an investigation is underway on this issue in cooperation with the agency, Gharibabadi said, “We told members of the IAEA that in view of the past record of acts of sabotage against our nuclear facilities, we will under no circumstances compromise our national security and the security of our nuclear facilities, and we insist that the agency must offer us full cooperation to carry this investigation until its final stage.”

He emphasized that the agency has announced in writing that it is ready to cooperate with Iran in the investigation of the incident regarding its inspector and this issue has been welcomed by the Iranian side.

The AEOI on Wednesday announced that an IAEA inspector, who was prevented from entering the nuclear site has left the country.

The AEOI added that the female monitor left her mission unfinished and flew out of Iran after security staff at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility didn’t let her in.

“As it is protocol, all of the IAEA inspectors’ belongings are closely inspected and scanned before they enter any of the country’s nuclear facilities,” read the AEOI statement.

“Upon this lady inspector’s entry, the security control machines sounded the alarm and denied her entry,” it said, adding that Iran had reported the issue to the IAEA.

Iran also told the international agency in the report that the inspector’s previous admissions at various sites were all scrapped and as a result, she decided to abort her mission and go back to the Austrian capital of Vienna.

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TEHRAN (Iran News) – The gas injection operation of centrifuge chains and collection of enriched uranium kicked off in Fordow site of the nuclear facility at the official notification of Iranian President Rouhani in early minutes on Thursday.

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Tehran and Moscow reached a deal on stable isotopes about a year ago, Kamalvandi said on Thursday, adding that different Iranian delegates have traveled to Russia and Russian experts have visited Iran since then.

“Today, we are at the stage of installing some equipment and Russian experts will arrive in Iran on Sunday to begin the installation work,” he told IRNA.

The project will probably begin on Sunday or the following day, he added.

Earlier on Thursday, the AP quoted Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency as saying that Russian technical specialists were set to arrive this week at the Fordow nuclear facility.

Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Yukiya Amano said in January 2016 that Iran had removed “excess centrifuges and infrastructure” from the Fordow enrichment facility in line with its commitments under the 2015 nuclear agreement, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

Amano made the remark in a statement issued on the first anniversary of the implementation of the JCPOA, which was signed between Iran and six world powers including the U.S., Russia, Britain, France, China and Germany.

The deal was reached in July 2015 and went into effect in January 2016.

Under the accord, Iran undertook to apply certain limits to its nuclear program in exchange for the termination of all nuclear-related sanctions that had been imposed against Tehran.

The IAEA, which is the official institution to verify Iranian compliance, has consistently confirmed the Islamic Republic’s commitment to its contractual obligations.

However, U.S. President Donald Trump strongly opposes the JCPOA – which was negotiated by his predecessor, Barack Obama – and warned that he might ultimately “terminate” it.

Last month, Trump extended waivers of key economic sanctions on Iran, lifted under the nuclear agreement, for another 120 days but said he was doing so “for the last time.”

He further called on European allies and the U.S. Congress to work with him to fix what he called “disastrous flaws” in the pact or face a U.S. exit.

Iranian officials have repeatedly dismissed U.S. calls for renegotiations, saying the JCPOA is not renegotiable.

“Trump’s policy & today’s announcement amount to desperate attempts to undermine a solid multilateral agreement, maliciously violating its paras 26, 28 & 29. JCPOA is not renegotiable: rather than repeating tired rhetoric, U.S. must bring itself into full compliance -just like Iran,” Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif tweeted on January 12.

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