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Iran Pollutes Nuclear Program
The traces of plutonium were spotted in enriched uranium taken for tests from a nuclear waste facility in Iran, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported yesterday, blaming the lack of cooperation on Iran in part of clarifying all aspects of its national nuclear program.
The finding of IAEA evoked suspicion at large as both plutonium and enriched uranium could be potentially used to produce nuclear warheads.
Asked to explain, IAEA said in the report, Iran called traces of enriched uranium the side product of declared nuclear activity, attributing it to containers’ contamination by the spent fuel of research nuclear reactor located in Tehran. At first, the containers were used to store spent fuel of research reactor and then to store irradiated targets from the so-called diluted uranium.
Bombarding uranium 238 by neurons generates plutonium, said Anatoly Diyakov, director of Center of Disarmament, Energy and Environment Problems. The presence of plutonium in enriched uranium could be explained by using the same containers to store irradiated fuel from Tehran reactor and irradiated targets. Highly-enriched uranium is usually used as fuel for research reactors, Diyakov specified.
But IAEA doesn’t appear satisfied with this explanation, the more so that Iran proceeds with uranium enrichment. It launched the second cascade of 164 gas centrifuges in October and set to pumping uranium hexafluoride into them. Uranium hexafluoride is the raw for generating enriched uranium by using isotopic separation.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Nov. 16, 2006
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