AFP, Tehran, April 14, 2010  – Iran has so far produced five kilograms of 20 percent enriched uranium, atomic chief Ali Akbar Salehi said Wednesday, in defiance of world powers who want Tehran to end the controversial nuclear work.
Iran began enriching uranium to 20 percent from February 9 following an order from President Mahmoud Ahamdinejad to Salehi.
’So far we have produced five kilos (11 pounds),’ Salehi told the ISNA news agency, adding that Iran needed ’one-and-half kilos of 20 percent enriched fuel every month’ to power the Tehran research reactor.
Ahamdinejad had issued the order to begin the 20 percent enrichment work after a UN-drafted deal for world powers to supply fuel to the Tehran reactor hit a deadlock.
World powers want Iran to halt its enrichment drive as they suspect it masks a weapons programme.
Tehran denies the charge and has been steadily enriching uranium at its plant in the central city of Natanz despite three sets of UN sanctions and threats of a fourth round.
Enriched uranium is the most controversial aspect of Iran’s nuclear programme as the material can be used to generate electricity or to make the fissile core of an atom bomb.
The enrichment method used by Iran is a classic type in which uranium hexafluoride (UF6) gas is whizzed around in a centrifuge at supersonic speeds.
The UN nuclear watchdog in its February report said Iran has installed 8,610 first generation IR-1 centrifuges at the Natanz plant.
On Friday, Iran said it has conducted mechanical tests on third generation centrifuges which can enrich uranium six times faster than the existing systems.
It also said that in the next coming months it will start mass production of second generation of centrifuges which can enrich uranium three times faster than the IR-1 machines.