Iran injects gas into advanced centrifuges in defiance of IAEA resolution

Mohammad Eslami, Head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization
Mohammad Eslami, Head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization

Iran has escalated its nuclear program by injecting gas into thousands of advanced centrifuges, a process to enrich uranium which could ultimately be used to develop a nuclear weapon.

It comes on the back of an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) censure resolution urging Tehran to enhance its cooperation with inspectors after enrichment of uranium reached 60%, near weapons-grade.

"We have begun injecting gas into several thousand advanced centrifuges, which is part of the nuclear industry's development program, and have put them into operational circuits," Mohammad Eslami, head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, said Wednesday.

Speaking after a cabinet meeting, Eslami said it was a response to Europe's initiative at a recent Board of Governors meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to censure the Islamic Republic for its lack of cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog.

According to Iran's Student News Agency, he said: "From the very beginning, we had stated that if the three European countries do not choose the path of engagement and instead pursue confrontation and resolution issuance, we will undoubtedly take reciprocal action without delay."

On Sunday, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said that the activation of new centrifuges was in response to the resolution.

"The Islamic Republic of Iran's reciprocal response to this political misuse of the Board of Governors was immediately put into action, and the deployment of a set of new and advanced centrifuges has begun," he said on Sunday.

The IAEA resolution, adopted on November 21, follows three years of restricted access to Iran’s nuclear sites and growing uranium stockpiles. By late October, the agency reported that Iran’s reserves included 182.3 kilograms of uranium enriched to 60%, a significant step toward nuclear weapons capability.

Eslami, however, argued that Iran’s nuclear activities remain within international frameworks.

"All of Iran’s nuclear activities are under the supervision of the agency and carried out in accordance with the Safeguards Agreement and NPT provisions," he added.

Last year, Iran banned one third of the IAEA's inspectors with multiple politicians such as Ahmad Bakhshayesh Ardestani, a member of the National Security and Foreign Policy Commission of Iran’s Parliament, supporting nuclear armament as a military deterrent. Earlier, Tehran had restricted IAEA's monitoring cameras at its nuclear facilities.

"Under current circumstances, Iran should first move toward increasing uranium enrichment, potentially raising the enrichment level to 70% or 80%. In the second phase, Iran should pursue nuclear weapon production,” he told the Didban news website in Tehran.

Referring to the war of attrition with Israel amid global sanctions for exceeding international limits for enrichment, he added: "If we produce a nuclear bomb, the resulting tension will last no more than six months. Western countries will object to why we developed nuclear weapons, and we can respond by pointing out that they have sanctioned us enough already and have no new sanctions left to impose.”