Agency: Iran Completes Installation of Three Cascades of Advanced IR-6 Centrifuges

According to Reuters, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has confirmed in a report to member states that Iran has completed the installation of three cascades of “advanced IR-6 centrifuges” at the uranium enrichment facility in Natanz.

Reuters said it obtained a copy of this report on Wednesday, August 3rd.

According to the report, the International Atomic Energy Agency also stated that Iran has informed the international body that it intends to install six cascades of “IR-2 centrifuges” at the Natanz facility.

This came hours earlier on the same day when Mohammad Eslami, head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, said that in line with a “strategic initiative to lift sanctions and protect the rights of the Iranian nation” and in response to recent U.S. actions, the Islamic Republic has begun “feeding gas to advanced centrifuges.”

In this regard, the spokesperson for Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization also reported yesterday on the injection of uranium gas into 500 advanced centrifuges.

Behrouz Kamalvandi characterized the gas injection into these centrifuges as part of the implementation of the “Law on Strategic Initiative to Lift Sanctions and Protect the Interests of the Iranian Nation” and stated: “Of the thousand IR-6 centrifuges that we needed to feed gas to and operate, we had previously fed gas to 500 centrifuges and 500 others had been installed but had not begun operation, which we started on Tuesday, and it will take approximately one week to obtain the first product from them.”

He also emphasized that this measure was taken to meet the country’s need for “190 thousand SWU.”

“Noor News,” a news website close to Iran’s Supreme National Security Council secretariat, also wrote yesterday: “These machines are located in halls constructed in the basement of the Natanz complex, which is in an appropriate security and protection situation from a passive defense perspective.”

Following the “unilateral” U.S. withdrawal from the JCPOA in 2018, the administration of Donald Trump, then U.S. president, imposed severe sanctions against Iran’s financial sector and oil exports. In response, Iran withdrew from several of its nuclear commitments under the JCPOA a year later and has expanded its nuclear program.

The International Atomic Energy Agency, in a report on June 6th, while confirming the installation of one IR-6 centrifuge cascade, stated that Iran intends to install two other cascades.

In this regard, Rafael Grossi, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, warned that Iran’s nuclear program is advancing “very, very rapidly” in terms of ambition and capacity.

Iran announced the installation and operation of new centrifuges to the International Atomic Energy Agency as a new round of negotiations to revive the nuclear agreement known as the JCPOA is scheduled to resume on Thursday, August 4th in Vienna after a five-month hiatus.

The U.S. Special Representative for Iran also announced on Wednesday that he would travel to Vienna to participate indirectly in these negotiations. Robert Malley, however, clarified that while Washington is not optimistic about the outcome of these talks, “it is ready in good faith to strive for reaching an agreement.”

Source: Radio Farda