Iran Starts Enriching Uranium to More than 3.67%

By Staff, Agencies 

Iran announced on Sunday that it has started to enrich uranium to a higher purity than 3.67%, as the European signatories to a 2015 agreement with Tehran miss a 60-day deadline to offset the adverse impacts of a unilateral pullout by the United States.

Iran’s decision was announced during a joint news conference by Deputy Foreign Minister for Political Affairs Abbas Araqchi, Administration spokesman Ali Rabiei, and Behrouz Kamalvandi, the spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran [AEOI], in Tehran.

Kamalvandi said that Iran would increase uranium enrichment from the current 3.67% to the level that fulfills the needs of its power plants.

He also noted that the country had not yet decided on the level of enrichment for the Tehran research reactor.

Iran has previously said it needs five-percent enrichment for its Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) and 20-percent for Tehran research reactor.

Araqchi said that the Europeans were yet to meet Iran’s demands, including regarding a non-dollar direct payment channel with Iran known as INSTEX but were also making certain efforts, indicating that those efforts could still bear fruit.

He further stated that US President Donald Trump’s so-called maximum pressure campaign had failed.

The deputy Iranian foreign minister also noted that Iran was holding talks with Chinese and English officials regarding the redesign of Arak reactor, which the US had originally undertaken to carry out under the JCPOA. He said those talks were proceeding for now but added that Iran had the will and technology to redesign the reactor on its own if the talks failed to produce favorable results.

He also said Iran had planned out 60-day contingencies for every European failure to meet Iranian demands and could potentially ultimately scrap the deal altogether.

Trump unilaterally withdrew from the JCPOA in May 2018, introducing old and new sanctions on Iran and seeking to scupper its implementation by the remaining signatories, including mainly Europe.