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Inspectors Say Iran Is Enriching Uranium at Mountain Site

Atomic inspectors in Vienna confirmed Monday that Iran has begun enriching uranium at a new plant carved out of a mountain, an act of defiance that comes amid rising tensions between Washington and Tehran over oil revenues and global sanctions.

More than five years ago, the United Nations Security Council began calling on Iran to stop purifying uranium, which can fuel nuclear reactors or atom bombs. Instead, Tehran accelerated its efforts, saying its nuclear program is entirely peaceful in nature.

In past days, Iranian officials have claimed they were about to begin operating the new plant — known as Fordo and located in a mountainous region near the holy city of Qum. It is Iran’s second major enrichment site, and it is buried deep underground. That makes it not only less vulnerable to attack but also potentially far more opaque. It remained an Iranian secret until its existence was unveiled more than two years ago.

A spokeswoman for the International Atomic Energy Agency, Gill Tudor, said Monday that the agency could confirm that Iran has begun enriching uranium at the Fordo plant.

“All nuclear material in the facility remains under the agency’s containment and surveillance,” she added in a statement. The agency’s inspectors have routinely monitored the plant’s construction since its unveiling.

Ms. Tudor added that Iran was enriching uranium at the underground plant to 20 percent purity — a level that can make fuel for a research reactor in Tehran. But that concentration is also far easier to make into fuel for an atom bomb, compared to uranium enriched at Iran’s sprawling main plant in the desert at Natanz. New details of the Fordo plant’s operation will likely be contained in a technical report on Iran to the agency’s board, which is due out late next month. While Iran has often exaggerated its nuclear abilities, nuclear experts say the Fordo operation seems quite genuine.

In early 2006, Iran began enriching uranium on an industrial scale with centrifuges, machines that spin extraordinarily fast to separate atoms of differing mass. The desert complex Natanz raises the level of uranium 235 from the natural concentration of 0.7 percent in mined ore to roughly 4 percent — a level suitable for nuclear reactors. Uranium 235 easily splits in two in bursts of atomic energy.

At Fordo, the plant takes enriched uranium from Natanz and uses rows of centrifuges in underground halls to further concentrate the material to a purity of 20 percent.

Because uranium enrichment becomes much easier as it goes from low to high concentrations, weapons experts consider that very close to bomb-grade fuel, where the concentrations of uranium 235 are raised to around 90 percent.

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