Nuclear Fuel

TEHRAN, Iran — Iranian scientists have produced the nation's first nuclear fuel rod, a feat of engineering the West has doubted Tehran capable of, the country's nuclear agency said Sunday. The announcement marks another step in Tehran's efforts to achieve proficiency in the entire nuclear fuel cycle — from exploring uranium ore to producing nuclear fuel — despite U.N. sanctions and measures by the U.S. and others to get it to halt aspects of its atomic work that could provide a possible pathway to weapons production.

Iran and six world powers wrapped up talks Thursday still far apart over how to oversee Tehran's atomic program, but with resolve to keep dialogue going as an alternative to possible military action. Envoys said they will meet again next month in Moscow after negotiations stretched out for extra hours and a sandstorm shut the airport in Iraq's capital. But the two sides agreed on little else during two dramatic days of discussions that underscored the serious challenges of reaching accords between Iran and the West.

TEHRAN — Iran has submitted a proposal to Russia to jointly assemble the nuclear fuel for the country’s new power reactor and any future facilities, state media reported yesterday. The move appeared to be an attempt by Tehran to gain some control over the nuclear fuel process at its Russian-built Bushehr nuclear plant. With Moscow’s help, Iran began loading uranium fuel into the facility on Saturday. The United States and allies lifted their opposition to the Bushehr plant after Russia pledged to handle all the nuclear fuel to make sure no material is shifted to a possible...

AMMAN, Jordan - Iran signaled a willingness Tuesday to allow potentially intrusive international inspections of secret military facilities, raising expectations that it was searching for a diplomatic solution to the standoff over its nuclear program. With talks between Iran and global powers set to begin Wednesday in Baghdad, the director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Yukiya Amano, said he had reached something of a breakthrough with Iranian officials on the agency's longstanding request for access to the facilities.

TEHRAN -- Russia's top nuclear official will sign a deal today to supply Iran with fuel for its first nuclear reactor, an Iranian official said. The agreement has safeguards intended to prevent use of the fuel for weapons, but it is sure to add to US concerns about Iran's nuclear program. The United States and Israel fear the Iranians could use the Bushehr reactor to build nuclear weapons. Russia argues that cannot happen because the deal calls for spent fuel to be returned, and UN nuclear specialists will monitor the facility.

TEHRAN - Iran now controls the entire cycle for producing nuclear fuel, the Iranian president said yesterday, highlighting his country's growing capabilities at a time when the United States wants to negotiate with Iran over its nuclear program. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's comments came two days after the inauguration of a facility that produces uranium oxide fuel pellets for a planned heavy-water reactor - the final step in the long, sophisticated nuclear fuel cycle. "Today, with the grace of God, Iran is a country controlling the entire nuclear fuel cycle," Ahmadinejad said on...

TEHRAN -- Iran told the UN nuclear watchdog agency yesterday it planned to resume nuclear fuel research after a 2 1/2-year hiatus, a vague declaration that was likely to be taken in the West as fresh evidence that Tehran was trying to build an atomic weapon. International Atomic Energy Agency head Mohamed ElBaradei said it was important that Tehran "maintains its suspension of all enrichment-related activity" as a way of reducing international suspicions about its nuclear plans.

WASHINGTON -- President Bush yesterday renewed his push for the expansion of nuclear energy and sought support for plans to revive nuclear fuel reprocessing to deal with radioactive waste from commercial power plants. "As America and other nations build more nuclear power plants, we must work together to address two challenges," Bush said in his weekly radio address. "We must dispose of nuclear waste safely, and we must keep nuclear technology and material out of the hands of terrorist networks and terrorist states.

BUSHEHR, Iran -- Iran and Russia ignored US objections and signed a nuclear-fuel agreement yesterday that is key to bringing Tehran's first reactor online by mid-2006. The long-delayed deal, signed at the heavily guarded Bushehr nuclear facility in southern Iran, dramatized President Bush's failure to persuade the Russians to curtail support for the Iranian nuclear program during his summit with Vladimir V. Putin on Thursday in Slovakia. Under the deal, Russia will provide nuclear fuel to Iran, then take the spent fuel, a step meant as a safeguard to ensure...

TEHRAN - Iran’s president yesterday dismissed a year-end deadline set by the Obama administration and the West for Tehran to accept a UN-drafted deal to swap enriched uranium for nuclear fuel. The United States warned Iran to take the deadline seriously. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also accused the United States of fabricating a purported Iranian secret document that appears to lay out a plan for developing a critical component of an atomic bomb. His remarks underscored Tehran’s defiance in the nuclear standoff - and also sought to send a message that his government has not...

The head of the U.N. nuclear agency arrived Monday in Tehran on a key mission that could lead to the resumption of probes by the watchdog on whether Iran has secretly worked on an atomic weapon. It would also strength the Islamic Republic's negotiating hand in crucial nuclear talks with six world powers later this week in Baghdad. International Atomic Energy Agency chief Yukiya Amano and his two aides were quickly whisked away after landing at the Tehran airport before dawn Monday.

The head of the U.N. nuclear agency flew to Tehran on Sunday on a delicate mission that — if successful — could finally lift the veil on whether Iran is seeking atomic arms while strengthening the Islamic Republic's negotiating hand in crucial nuclear talks with six world powers later in the week. The trip by International Atomic Energy Agency chief Yukiya Amano is focused on getting agreement from Iran to terms that will allow the agency to resume probing whether Tehran secretly worked on nuclear arms.

TEHRAN — Iran is signaling a possible compromise offer heading into crucial talks with world powers deeply suspicious of its nuclear program: offering to scale back uranium enrichment but not abandon the ability to make nuclear fuel. The proposal was floated by Fereidoun Abbasi Davani, the country's nuclear chief, as part of the early parrying in various capitals before negotiations get underway Friday. It suggested that sanctions-battered Iran is ready to bargain, although there were conflicting signals coming from Tehran on Monday.

WASHINGTON - International nuclear inspectors reported yesterday that Iran was moving rapidly to produce nuclear fuel at a deep underground site that Israel and the United States have said is virtually invulnerable to attack. The report by the International Atomic Energy Agency indicated that for the first time Iran had begun producing fuel inside the new facility in a mountain near the holy city of Qum. The agency's inspectors found in their most recent visits that over the past three months Iran has tripled its production capacity for a type of fuel that is far closer...

LONDON - Besieged by international sanctions on the Iranian nuclear program including a planned oil embargo by Europe, Iran warned six European buyers yesterday that it might strike first by immediately cutting them off from Iranian oil. Iran's official Islamic Republic News Agency said the threat was conveyed to the ambassadors of Italy, Spain, France, the Netherlands, Greece, and Portugal in separate meetings at the Foreign Ministry in Tehran....

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran claimed today that it has achieved two major advances in its program to master production of nuclear fuel, a defiant move in response to increasingly tough Western sanctions over its controversial nuclear program. In a further show of resistance to international pressure, state media reported Iran was taking steps to cut oil exports to six European countries in retaliation for new European Union sanctions, including a ban on Iranian oil. The semiofficial Mehr agency said that Iran has halted exports to...

VIENNA - Iran has allowed a top UN atomic inspector access to a site where it is developing advanced centrifuges that can be used to make nuclear fuel and to arm warheads, diplomats said yesterday. The diplomats said that Herman Nackaerts, deputy director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, also was allowed to tour Iran's heavy water production plant for the first time. Heavy water reactors - like the research unit being built by Iran - produce plutonium which, along with enriched uranium, can be used for the fissile core of nuclear warheads.

MONTPELIER -- Two missing pieces of a highly radioactive nuclear fuel rod may have been lost in 1979 and may never be found, officials said yesterday. Engineers at the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant discovered the pieces were missing this week when they looked inside the stainless steel container that documents showed housed them. "They weren't there," said Rob Williams, spokesman for Entergy Nuclear, which owns Vermont Yankee. The last time the pieces can be accounted for was in 1979 when they were pulled from the Vermont...

Iran's official news agency says that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will unveil new nuclear projects on Wednesday. IRNA did not say in its Tuesday report what the projects would be. But an independent news website that regularly reports on nuclear developments says the ceremonies are likely to include the formal inauguration of the the underground Fordo uranium enrichment site in central Iran, and starting operations on two lines of centrifuges there....