Iran started completely loading fuel into its only nuclear reactor on Tuesday, after a leak in the Russian-built reactor's basin late the process for months, state media reported. Iran's Atomic Energy Agency (IAEO) said a series of test had been run and that it had currently started loading 163 fuel rods into the reactor's core. Russia is supply the uranium fuel for the plant, for 10 years, at an enrichment level well below what is wanted for a nuclear weapon. The 1,000-megawatt nuclear power plant is expected to start generate electricity in about three months, more than 35 years after the start of building, IAEO head Ali Akbar Salehi told state television. The original service provider was a German company.
The plant, located near the Persian Gulf city of Bushehr, is not extensively regarded as a threat by Western countries, which fear Iran is creation a nuclear weapon, something Iran denies. Rather, it is a symbol of the Islamic Republic' s progress in spite of sanctions against the country. At the start of fuel loading tests in August, the U.S. State Department said it did not view the plant as a proliferation risk but harassed its continued concerns about Iran's nuclear program. At that time, Israel, which says Iran is planning to create a nuclear weapon, also said it was not particularly worried about the plant, but required Iran to stop enriching uranium. The loading of fuel is oversee by International Atomic Energy Organization, Iranian officials said.
China has been honest in its efforts to uphold nuclear sanctions against Iran, the Foreign Ministry said Tuesday, though a spokesman would not deny that some Chinese companies may be given that restricted technology to Tehran. The comments came after The Washington Post reported that the U.S. has asked Beijing to do additional to stop Chinese companies from providing assistance and expertise to Iran's efforts to expand nuclear weapons and more powerful missiles. In Washington, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said the U.S. has told Beijing about its concern about certain Chinese companies. China has said it would examine, he said.
The Post reported Robert Einhorn, the State Department official who manage the enforcement of sanction against Iran, gave a "significant list" of such company and banks to Chinese officials last month. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu said China believe all countries should execute U.N. resolutions beside Iran in a "comprehensive, accurate and earnest" manner."China has always been honest in implementing and fulfilling our international requirement and has taken a positive part in this regard," Ma said at a regularly scheduled briefing.
However, asked to deny outright that Chinese companies or banks were concerned in transfer nuclear technology to Iran, Ma declined, saying only: "I have given a very comprehensive statement on our position." In June, the U.N. imposed a fourth round of sanction on Iran over its rejection to halt uranium enrichment. Western countries are disturbed the program masks Iranian ambitions for making nuclear weapons. Iran says it wants to enrich uranium to create fuel for a planned reactor network and denies charge that it will use the program to make fissile warhead material.
A shipment of bomb grade uranium arrived at a safe ability in Russia Monday, sent from a research reactor in Poland as part of a contest to secure dangerous radioactive material around the world. There was no way to mistake the shipment for something innocuous like Polish sausage the trucks were escorted by greatly armed police officers and plastered with large radioactive signs. "I feel like we are prepared for everything, but you are just a small bit nervous," said Igor Bolshinsky who is part of small American team that planned the nuclear road trip. His group was answerable for the transport of the uranium from Poland back to Russia, where it came from in the first place.
The route is complicated: The fabric will travel by truck to Warsaw, by train to the Baltic port of Gdynia, by boat to the Russian port of Murmansk, and lastly by train to high security ability in Siberia. This uranium was never future for weapons it was fuel for a small nuclear reactor that scientists use for research. Globally there are over one hundred research reactors resembling the one in Poland. "Most of them were supplied either by the United States or the Soviet Union through the Cold War.
They do all kinds of special work, ranging from training students to even interesting archeology and medical research," says Matthew Bunn, and specialist on nuclear security at Harvard.These reactors are using highly enrich uranium fuel pure enough for a bomb. Since Sept. 11, the U.S. government has grown increasingly concerned that terrorists could steal this material or buy it. And Bunn speak these reactors are not very well guarded. "They are just not places where it's plausible that you are forever going to have the kinds of military level security that is actually, in my view, appropriate," he says.
Head of the Atomic Energy organization of Iran (AEOI) told reporters Sunday the ground is being ready to load uranium fuel rods into the reactor’s core in the near future. He dismissed media reports on the spoil caused by a Trojan virus named Stuxnet. Salehi said only a few personal computers of some staff were infected with the virus and the general system was not harmed. The nuclear chief further explained detecting a small leakage at the main core of the reactor, which was quickly sealed, caused recent delay for the opening of Bushehr plant.
‘During the Bushehr power plant's washing progression a leak was discovered at the side pool of the reactor and it was plugged. This leakage postponed the behavior of the plant for a few days,’ Salehi said. Iran’s successful launch of its first nuclear reactor would boost electricity manufacture by 1000 megawatts once the plant reaches its maximum output. Tehran plans to build ten extra nuclear power plants within next few years.
United States views oil and gas-rich Iran's autonomy in the field of nuclear technology, posing a direct threat to its own interests in the region. Western countries ever since the end of WWII and up until recently have been able to take advantage of the region's fit technological backwardness to access cheap oil and gas and boost their industrial economies.
