Iran's secret uranium enrichment project

Con Coughlin:

United Nations officials investigating Iran's nuclear programme say they have found convincing evidence that the Iranians are working on a secret uranium enrichment project that has not been officially declared.

Suspicions were raised after officials from the UN-sponsored International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) travelled to Pakistan at the end of last year to interview A Q Khan, the atomic scientist who masterminded the successful development of Pakistan's nuclear weapons arsenal.

Khan is known to have sold Teheran the technical expertise to develop an atomic bomb, together with key components, such as sophisticated equipment for enriching uranium. During the interview with IAEA inspectors, Khan is said to have provided a full disclosure of the nuclear dossier he gave the Iranians. The inspectors compared Khan's material against the documentation the Iranians have so far provided.

"There are a number of glaring inconsistencies between what the Iranians are telling us and the information the IAEA got from Khan," said a diplomat closely involved in the IAEA's negotiations with Teheran. "Consequently the IAEA inspectors are now convinced that the Iranians have another, small-scale uranium processing and enrichment project that is being kept secret from the outside world."

IAEA officials are trying to establish whether Iran has what they call "parallel" nuclear enrichment facilities, which they suspect are being developing at closed military bases around the country.

The current diplomatic crisis over Iran's uranium enrichment activity is centred on the uranium processing plant at Isfahan and the uranium enrichment facility at Natanz. The existence of the latter facility, which will soon have the capacity to enrich uranium to weapons grade, was unknown until Iranian exiles disclosed its location in 2003.

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