The United States, France, the United Kingdom and Germany expressed their opposition to the acceleration of Iran’s production of highly enriched uranium, considering this measure to be part of the escalation of Iran’s nuclear program.
The United States, France, the United Kingdom and Germany condemned on Thursday, the acceleration in the production of highly enriched uranium by the Islamic Republic of Iran, revealed the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in a report published on Tuesday.
“We condemn this measure, which further aggravates the continuing escalation of Iran’s nuclear program”, they said in a joint statement, adding that “Iran’s production of highly enriched uranium has no credible civilian justification”.
According to the UN agency, Iran has “increased its production of highly enriched uranium in recent weeks, after having slowed the pace since mid-2023”.
“These facts constitute a step in the wrong direction on Iran’s part, resulting in the tripling of its monthly production of uranium enriched to 60%”, denounce in their communiqué Washington, Paris, Berlin and London, who worry about “significant proliferation risks”.
“These decisions demonstrate Iran’s unwillingness to engage in de-escalation in good faith, and reflect irresponsible behavior in a tense regional context”, they added, calling on Tehran to “cooperate fully with the IAEA”.
For its part, Iran asserted on Wednesday that there was “nothing new” in the IAEA report. “We were producing the same (rate) of enrichment at 60%. We haven’t changed anything and we haven’t developed any new capacities,” said Mohammad Eslami, head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI), quoted by the official Irna agency.
Iran is now enriching at levels far from the 3.67% ceiling set by the 2015 international agreement governing Tehran’s atomic activities, and is closing in on the 90% needed to produce an atomic bomb. It denies, however, that it intends to acquire nuclear weapons.
The slowdown in production to 60%, noted by the IAEA a few months ago, was seen by experts as a gesture at a time when talks had resumed with the United States.
The Iran nuclear deal had shattered following Washington’s withdrawal in 2018, decided by then US President Donald Trump. His successor Joe Biden attempted to revive it via talks in Vienna, but these have been at a standstill since the summer of 2022.
However, animosity has risen a notch in recent months with the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas, which Washington and Tehran accuse each other of aggravating.
The Islamic Republic has also excluded IAEA inspectors and disconnected cameras needed to monitor its nuclear program.
With AFP
