Iran said on Sunday that it would delay the start of its first nuclear reactor, in the southern city of Bushehr, until 2006, but that it intended to build more nuclear power plants with Russian aid.
Assadollah Sabouri, the deputy chief of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, who is in charge of the power plant project, said at a news conference that the reactor would start seven months after the Russians hand over the keys, now expected to occur early in 2006. He said the reactor could then start by October 2006. The final cost will exceed US$1 billion, he said. Iran had hoped at one point that the reactor would start operating by the end of this year.
"We have contracts with Russia to build more nuclear reactors," Sabouri said. "No number has been specified, but definitely our contract with Russia is to build more than one nuclear power plant."
The US has raised concerns about Iran's nuclear projects, contending that Iran is trying to develop nuclear weapons. The country's capability to enrich uranium has raised concerns that it can produce nuclear bombs.
Iran began building two nuclear reactors in Bushehr, with German help, before the 1979 revolution, but the work stopped because of the revolution and the war with Iraq from 1980 to 1988. Russia undertook to finish one of the plants.
Sabouri said two other European countries had expressed interest in the projects, but he declined to identify them.
"My message to Europeans is that we have to pass the paperwork stage and go for binding contracts as soon as possible," he said.
Sabouri said that under the revised schedule, Iran would need to receive nuclear fuel from Russia by the end of next year, and that Iran had agreed to return the spent fuel to Russia.
"There is no ambiguity on returning the spent fuel," he said. "What we have not agreed on with Russia is the expenses."
Iran has said that it is planning to produce its own fuel, but Sabouri said on Sunday that Iran is still "many years away" from making its own fuel.
"For the first stage we have a contract with the Russians for the supply of fuel for 10 years," he said. "We are counting on the fact that we can use the fuel produced by Iran for the second phase."
John Bolton, the US undersecretary of state for arms control, said on Thursday that Iran had informed UK, French and German officials it could produce weapons-grade uranium within a year and a nuclear weapon no more than three years after that, The Associated Press reported.
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