An undefined “accident” occurred on Sunday morning at the uranium enrichment plant at Natanz in central Iran, without causing casualties or dispersal of radioactive material. This was reported by the Fars agency, which quotes the spokesman for the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization. “An accident – said the organization’s spokesman, Behrouz Kamalvandi – occurred in the electricity grid of the Chahid-Ahmadi-Rochan enrichment plant”, the Natanz nuclear complex where the Iranian authorities launched new banned centrifuges on Saturday from the 2015 nuclear deal.
The Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, the civilian arm of the Iranian nuclear program, released a statement using the “accident” formula also used by state television, without going into detail. The Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, which monitors the Iranian program, said it was “aware of media reports,” but declined to comment.
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The new centrifuges
On Saturday 10 April, Iran announced the commissioning of 164 IR-6 centrifuges in Natanz. Officials have also begun testing the more advanced IR-9 centrifuge, which they say will enrich uranium 50 times faster than Iran’s first-generation IR-1 centrifuge. The latter were those allowed by the painstakingly reached international nuclear agreement and from which the United States under the presidency of Donald Trump withdrew in 2018. In summary, the agreement provided for the gradual lifting of economic sanctions on Iran in exchange the limitation of the nuclear program and its control by the inspectors of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Nuclear agreement stopped
As the AP agency recalls, since the US withdrawal from the nuclear deal, Tehran has abandoned all the limits that had been agreed by implementing the enrichment levels of uranium to make it compatible with the construction of nuclear weapons. Although Iran claims that its atomic program is for peaceful purposes, fears that Tehran has the ability to manufacture a bomb has prompted world powers to reach the 2015 agreement. potential following the critical position and the decision to quit by the Trump administration. Now many are looking at possible decisions by the new US president Joe Biden.
Previous accidents
Natanz is the same facility that was previously targeted with a cyber attack with the Stuxnet virus. It was largely built underground to withstand any enemy air attacks. The site has been the focus of attention – and fear – of the West since 2002, when satellite photos showed signs of the construction of the plant some 200 kilometers south of the capital Tehran.