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Al-Ahed Telegram

Iran gets fifth batch of nuclear fuel

Iran gets fifth batch of nuclear fuel
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Source: alalam.ir, 22-01-2008
TEHRAN -Iran received the fifth shipment of nuclear fuel from Russia Tuesday for a power plant being constructed in the southern port of Bushehr.
The 11-ton consignment of enriched uranium arrived at the light-water Bushehr nuclear power plant on Tuesday morning.
The remainder of the fuel will arrive in three separate shipments in coming weeks, state television reported.
"Of 82 tons of initial fuel needed for the Bushehr nuclear power plant, 55 tons have been shipped to Iran so far,'' the television report said.
Iran received the fourth shipment of nuclear fuel from Russia on Sunday.
The first shipment arrived on Dec. 17 after months of dispute between the two countries, allegedly over delayed construction payments for the reactor.
Iran has said Bushehr, the country's first nuclear reactor, will begin operating in the summer of 2008, producing half its 1,000-megawatt capacity of electricity.
Tehran heralded the first shipment as a victory, saying it proved its nuclear program was peaceful.
The US initially opposed Russian participation in building the Bushehr reactor and supplying it with fuel, but reversed its position about a year ago to obtain Moscow's support for the first set of UN sanctions against Iran.
Washington was also influenced by Iran's agreement to return spent nuclear fuel from the reactor back to Russia to ensure it doesn't extract plutonium to make atomic bombs.
Russia's decision to ship nuclear fuel to Iran follows a US intelligence report released last month that concluded Tehran did not have a nuclear weapons program.
It also came after the UN nuclear agency, the International Atomic Energy Agency, said Iran had been truthful about its past uranium enrichment activities.
Iran also has insisted it would continue enriching uranium because it needed to provide fuel to a 300-megawatt light-water reactor it was building in the southwestern town of Darkhovin.
Iranian officials have said they plan to generate 20,000 megawatts of electricity through nuclear energy in the next two decades.
On Tuesday, foreign ministers from major powers will meet in Berlin to discuss on Iran's nuclear program.
Russia says the Bushehr project is being built under the control of the UN nuclear agency.
Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki has said the Bushehr plant, on the Persian Gulf coast in southwest Iran, would start up in mid-2008.

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