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Iran soon to join nuclear club: leader
IRAN'S hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad declared tonight the Islamic republic will "soon join the club of countries that have nuclear technology", state television reported. The announcement came 15 days before the expiry of a UN Security Council deadline for Iran to slam the brakes on its uranium enrichment programme - the focus of fears the Islamic regime could acquire nuclear weapons. "Iran will soon join the club of countries that have nuclear technology," the president was quoted as saying in a speech in the northeast of the country. "The equation will change in favour of the Iranian people," Mr Ahmadinejad said. Mr Ahmadinejad has also told the country to expect "good news" later today about the nuclear drive, amid reports the country has made key progress in uranium enrichment to make reactor fuel. Enrichment is the process used to manufacture fuel for civil nuclear power stations but can be also be extended to manufacture the fissile core of an atomic bomb. On March 29, the UN Security Council called on Iran to suspend uranium enrichment to provide a watertight guarantee that its nuclear programme is peaceful, with International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei asked to report on Iranian compliance after 30 days. Iran categorically rejects charges that it is seeking atomic weapons and has so far rejected the ultimatum. And in an interview with the Kuwait news agency KUNA, influential former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani said a cascade of centrifuges - devices that spin at supersonic speeds to enrich uranium - had been operated at a facility in Natanz. "We operated the first unit which comprises 164 centrifuges, gas was injected, and we got the industrial output," Rafsanjani was quoted as saying. "We must expand the operation of these devices in order to become a full industrial unit, as we still need dozens of such units to become a plant for uranium enrichment," he said. Posted by: tipper 2006-04-11 |
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