Free Republic

Discovery of Iran's secret uranium enrichment facility near Qom several months ago is a "warning sign" for anyone who thinks that the Islamic Republic's nuclear program is for civilian purposes, head of Military Intelligence Maj.-Gen. Amos Yadlin said Tuesday. Speaking at a conference on security challenges in the 21st century at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, Yadlin said that Iran is extremely close to mastering the necessary nuclear technology and will wait on the threshold until it feels that the international community is too weak to stop them to move forward towards the bomb. Iran, he...

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran wants major amendments within the framework of a U.N. nuclear fuel deal which it broadly accepts, state media said, a move that could unravel the plan and expose Tehran to the threat of harsher sanctions. The European Union's foreign policy chief said on Tuesday there was no need to rework the U.N. draft and he and France's foreign minister suggested Tehran would rekindle demands for tougher international sanctions if it tried to undo the plan. Among the central planks of the plan opposed by Iran -- but requested by the West to cut the risk of...

Security: After Iran admits building a second enrichment facility inside a mountain, the Pentagon shifts money from other programs to urgently fund the mother of all bunker-buster bombs. Why the need for speed? At the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh last month, President Obama announced, "The Islamic Republic of Iran has been building a covert uranium enrichment facility near Qom for several years." U.S. officials said they knew for some time that the facility existed. The announcement was made after U.S. officials learned Iran had told the International Atomic Energy Agency of Qom's existence. Our knowledge of the facility built in...

Defense: As the failure of engagement with Iran grows more apparent, the administration that has talked very softly may be getting the mother of all sticks ready. Guess we need high-tech Cold War weapons after all.Western intelligence sources have told London's Times that Iran has perfected the means to develop and detonate a nuclear bomb and is merely awaiting word from its supreme leader to produce its first one. Should the order be given, it would take just six months to enrich enough uranium and another six months to assemble the warhead. Time's up. Recently, and perhaps not coincidentally, Defense...

At a landmark session that included the highest-level bilateral contact between U.S. and Iran in years Iran and six world powers put nuclear talks back on track The meeting ended with a pledge to meet again this month. Disputes, however, surfacing shortly after its conclusion indicated a rough road to agreement ahead. Iran accepted a demand Thursday at the talks in a villa outside Geneva to allow U.N. inspectors into its covertly built enrichment plant, in a move that appeared to defuse tensions that had been building for weeks. Western officials at the session said the Islamic republic had also...

Title only.

SEOUL, Sept. 4 (Yonhap) -- North Korea said Friday that it has entered a final phase of uranium enrichment, and is also building more nuclear weapons with spent fuel rods extracted from its only operating plutonium-producing reactor.

WASHINGTON, April 14, 2009 – For military students who can’t squeeze enough learning into the school year, the Department of Defense Education Activity has the perfect solution. For the fifth year, the agency is offering eligible students in kindergarten through 8th grade a free, four-week summer enrichment program with a curriculum emphasizing math and language arts. DoDEA officials expect enrollment of about 10 percent of all the 6,500 students in kindergarten through 8th grade in the activity’s school system, Joel K. Hansen, DoDEA’s special projects coordinator, said. “It’s not a remedial program. It’s not a program to help students...

US may cede to Iran’s nuclear ambition By Daniel Dombey in Washington Published: April 3 2009 17:29 | Last updated: April 3 2009 17:29 US officials are considering whether to accept Iran’s pursuit of uranium enrichment, which has been outlawed by the United Nations and remains at the heart of fears that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons capability. As part of a policy review commissioned by President Barack Obama, diplomats are discussing whether the US will eventually have to accept Iran’s insistence on carrying out the process, which can produce both nuclear fuel and weapons- grade material. “There’s a fundamental...

via translation - ALERT - Nuclear: Iran has 5,000 to 6,000 centrifuges TEHRAN - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Saturday that Iran had 5,000 to 6,000 centrifuges for uranium enrichment activities, confirming that the Islamic Republic has expanded its controversial nuclear programme, reported state radio.

UNITED NATIONS - UN chief Ban Ki-moon on Thursday made a fresh appeal to Iran to comply with UN demands that it halt sensitive nuclear fuel work and urged all Middle East parties to pursue peaceful dialogue. "I have been calling on Iranian authorities to fully comply with all relevant Security Council resolutions and continue their negotiations with European Union and concerned parties," he said on his return from a two-week, three-nation Asian tour. A spokeswoman for EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana refused to confirm Iranian press reports that he would visit the Iranian capital on July 19 to...

PARIS - Iran's written response to an incentives package aimed at curbing its nuclear programme made no mention of a suspension of uranium enrichment, a process that could potentially make fuel for bombs, France said on Tuesday. France, Britain, Germany, the United States, Russia and China made the revised offer to Iran last month, and Iran sent a reply to EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana last week. "There was no mention of a suspension of sensitive activities in this letter," French Foreign Ministry spokesman Eric Chevallier told a news conference, using an expression that refers to enrichment-related activities. Iran...

TEHRAN, Iran - President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad struck a defiant tone Monday on the 29th anniversary of the Islamic revolution, vowing not to slow Iran's nuclear program and announcing plans to launch more rockets into space as part of its drive to orbit a domestic satellite. Like Iran's nuclear activities, the country's space program has provoked unease abroad because the same technology needed to send satellites into space can be used to deliver warheads. Iranian officials insist both the space and nuclear programs are intended for peaceful purposes, and Ahmadinejad rallied Iranians against U.N. Security Council demands that Iran stop enriching...

U.S. scientists have discovered traces of enriched uranium on smelted aluminum tubing provided by North Korea, apparently contradicting Pyongyang's denial that it had a clandestine nuclear program, according to U.S. and diplomatic sources. The United States has long pointed to North Korea's acquisition of thousands of aluminum tubes as evidence of such a program, saying the tubes could be used as the outer casing for centrifuges needed to spin hot uranium gas into the fuel for nuclear weapons. North Korea has denied that contention and, as part of a declaration on its nuclear programs due by the end of the...

Excerpt - VIENNA (AFP) - Iran blocked UN atomic experts on a first unannounced test inspection of an underground nuclear site where it enriches uranium, despite a pledge to allow such visits, diplomats told AFP Thursday. The watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency had in March told Iran to allow its inspectors to install surveillance cameras at the site in Natanz but Tehran refused this and in return promised to allow frequent, unannounced visits. A first test on April 21 of this agreement "was a total failure," said a diplomat in Vienna, home to the IAEA, who added that a successful...

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia - Iran is still only operating several hundred centrifuges at its uranium enrichment plant outside the city of Natanz, despite its claims to have activated 3,000 of the devices, the head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency said Thursday. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced Monday that the Natanz facility had begun "industrial-scale" production of nuclear fuel in a major advance in Iran's uranium enrichment program, which the United Nations has demanded be halted. Iran's top nuclear negotiator said that workers had begun injecting uranium gas into a new array of 3,000 centrifuges, a large jump over the...

VIENNA (AFP) - Iran stopped UN inspectors from visiting an underground bunker where it is building an industrial-scale plant to make enriched uranium but the inspectors will try again, diplomats told AFP Monday. Iran had however promised "frequent inspector access" to the site in Natanz, the UN watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported in February. The highly sensitive inspections, and talks over how they are to take place, came as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was expected to plead Iran's case this week before the UN Security Council, which is considering tightening sanctions on the Islamic republic over fears...

AP News Alert Iranian president says his country ready to halt uranium enrichment provided the West does the same and shuts down its own nuclear programs.

News analysis: Iran's boast on uranium enrichment is put to yest By William J. Broad and David E. Sanger Published: February 3, 2007 After decades of largely clandestine efforts, Iran is expected to declare in coming days that it has made a huge leap toward industrial-scale production of enriched uranium — a defiant act that the country's leaders will herald as a major technical stride and its neighbors will denounce as a looming threat. But for now, many nuclear experts say, the frenetic activity at the desert enrichment plant in Natanz may be mostly about political showmanship. The many setbacks...

Report: Swiss Had Role in S. African Nukes Friday October 28, 2005 4:01 AM GENEVA (AP) - Switzerland played a key role in building the nuclear weapons of the former apartheid regime of South Africa, a government-sponsored report said Thursday. More than a decade ago, then-South African President F.W. de Klerk announced that his country had dismantled its nuclear weapons program. Peter Hug, the author of a report in the Swiss National Science Foundation's six-year investigation into Swiss-South African relations, said Switzerland and other countries provided technical support for South Africa's uranium enrichment efforts. Hug, a history professor at the...

ALARM - Iran installs centrifugal machines with Natanz VIENNA - Iran started to install centrifugal machines on its site of Natanz, where it hopes to use 3.000 of them to enrich by uranium in spite of the calls of UNO, declared Thursday of the diplomats.

Iran prevents the work of inspectors of the IAEA VIENNA - Iran prevents inspectors of the IAEA from installing cameras of monitoring in a nuclear installation where Teheran wishes to place 3.000 centrifugal machines to enrich by uranium on industrial scale, diplomats Thursday indicated to AFP. Inspectors of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) are currently with the nuclear installation of Natanz (center of Iran) where an underground site is in the process of construction.

VIENNA, Austria (AP) -- Iran's uranium enrichment program appears stalled despite tough talk from the Tehran leadership, leaving intelligence services guessing about why it has not made good on plans to press ahead with activities that the West fears could be used to make nuclear arms, diplomats said Thursday. Outside monitoring of Iran's nuclear endeavors is restricted to International Atomic Energy Agency inspections of declared sites leaving significant blind spots for both the agency and intelligence agencies of member countries trying to come up with the full picture. Still, Tehran's reluctance to crank up activities at its declared enrichment site...

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran has doubled its capacity to enrich uranium by successfully executing the process with a second network of centrifuges, a semiofficial news agency reported Friday, sending a defiant new message to the U.N. Security Council. Council members are working on a draft resolution that would impose limited sanctions on the Islamic republic because of its refusal to cease enrichment, a process that can produce fuel for a civilian nuclear reactor or fissile material for a warhead. The Iranian Students News Agency quoted an anonymous official as saying Iran has successfully begun injecting gas into a second network...

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran has injected gas into a second network of centrifuges and has obtained the output, Iran's student news agency ISNA reported on Friday, referring to part of a program the West fears is aimed at making bombs.ISNA quoted an "informed source" saying "the injection of gas was carried out" in the past week. "We have obtained the product of the second cascade," the source said. But the report also said uranium had not been put into the system yet, although it said this could happen in the next few days. It was not immediately clear what gas...

LUXEMBOURG (Reuters) - The European Union was set to back limited United Nations sanctions against Iran on Tuesday after Tehran spurned conditions for opening negotiations on its nuclear programme. Diplomats said the EU's 25 foreign ministers were due to discuss possible incremental measures targeted initially at individuals and materials involved in Iranian uranium enrichment activities, which the West suspects is aimed at making a bomb. "The most important thing is to have a united response as we showed with North Korea. We must show Iran that the international community is completely determined to remain united," European External Relations Commissioner Benita...

Tehran - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Wednesday that the Western position in the nuclear dispute is getting weaker. 'The Western position against us is day by day getting weaker while ours is getting stronger,' Ahmadinejad said in a speech in the city of Shahriar, west of the capital Tehran. 'The West is getting unstable in its decisions. One day they threaten us, the other day they come with a smile,' the Iranian president said in the speech carried live by the news network Khabar. Ahmadinejad reiterated that Iran's nuclear programmes would continue despite all pressures and intimidation, but stressed...

Thomas report - Download 525k Listen to Thomas report North Korea's claims to have detonated a nuclear weapon are expected to have wide-reaching effects on efforts to stem nuclear proliferation, especially with regard to Iran. Tehran will be calculating what the international response to the North Korean test will be, and how it will affect its bargaining position. North Korea's leader Kim Jong Il The physical shock waves from North Korea's test may have been limited, but the political shock waves are far more profound, and no more so than in Tehran.Karim Sadjapour, an Iranian affairs analyst with the International...

MOSCOW, October 10 (Itar-Tass) - The situation regarding the Iranian nuclear problem was in the focus of attention during the conversation on Tuesday between Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Kislyak and ambassador of the Republic of Iran to Moscow Gholamreza Ansari. The diplomats also exchanged opinions on a number of international problems, the ministry noted. The meeting was held at the request of the Iranian ambassador. Nicholas Burns, the US undersecretary of state, said earlier to the BBC that the drafting of a new Security Council resolution on Iran’s nuclear programme would start this week. He said the resolution would...

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Dozens of protesters pelted the Danish embassy in Tehran with stones and petrol bombs on Tuesday after Danish television broadcast footage deemed insulting to the Muslim Prophet Mohammad, witnesses said. Denmark's state TV aired footage on Friday of a number of members of the youth wing of the anti-immigrant Danish People's Party (DPP) drawing cartoons in August mocking the Prophet. Iran condemned the broadcast. Reuters witnesses said protesters hurled stones and petrol bombs into the embassy compound. The crowd chanted "Down with Zionists" and "God praise the party of God". Riot police guarded the embassy and two...

(Agencies) A NORTH Korean official has warned the communist nation could fire a nuclear-tipped missile unless the US acts to resolve its standoff with Pyongyang, a South Korean news agency has reported. "We hope the situation will be resolved before an unfortunate incident of us firing a nuclear missile comes," the unnamed official said, according to a Yonhap report from Beijing.

"The transfer of nuclear weapons or material by North Korea to states or nonstate entities would be considered a grave threat to the United States, and we would hold North Korea fully accountable of the consequences of such action," Mr. Bush said . . .

Mr Keating said . . . "My great concern is that Japan may use the impasse of North Korea and this testing of its nuclear weapons to move into nuclear weapons itself, eschewing the nuclear protection provided to it by the United States under its umbrella," he told a business breakfast.

'Doomsday Clock' may tick toward midnight Many people in the Chicago area are closely watching developments in North Korea. "This is as bad as it gets," said Dr. Brian Kellman, director of the International Weapons Control Center at DePaul University. Kellman says North Korea's nuclear test doesn't come as a surprise, but it takes the arms race to the next level. "How do you now tell Iran that they can't do it? And then, we have nuclear weapons all along the northeast corridor of Asia all the way down to Iran, in a string, India, Pakistan, Iran," said Kellman. The...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush, facing a new election-year foreign policy crisis, condemned North Korea's reported nuclear test on Monday and vowed the United States will respect its security commitments in Asia. Democrats eager to oust Republicans from control of the U.S. Congress wasted no time in accusing him of being in a "state of denial" about North Korea for several years as he pursued war in Iraq. They demanded a change in strategy. In his first reaction to the North Korean test, Bush said he talked by phone with the leaders of China, South Korea, Japan and...

HONG KONG (MarketWatch) -- South Korean stocks dropped sharply Monday after North Korea announced it had conducted an underground nuclear weapons test, raising concerns that investment money may flow out of its neighbor to the south over risk concerns.

LONDON (AP) - High-level representatives from the United States, Britain, France, Germany, China and Russia are planning to meet in London on Friday to assess Iran's refusal to suspend uranium-enrichment. They are expected to refer the Iranian nuclear case to the UN Security Council, which will start discussing possible sanctions against Iran next week, some western diplomats said Thursday. Russia's foreign minister, however, said he believes it is too soon to impose sanctions and further efforts are needed to push Iran to negotiate. To avoid alienating Russia and China, any sanctions are likely to be relatively mild, including embargoes on...

Gollust report - Download 304k Listen to Gollust report U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Wednesday Iran will not suspend uranium enrichment and it is time for the U.N. Security Council to move on sanctions against Tehran. Rice is expected to meet with fellow foreign ministers from the other permanent Security Council member countries and Germany on the issue as early as this week. Condoleezza Rice Though a Security Council deadline for Iran to halt enrichment expired August 31, the major powers allowed a dialogue between the European Union and Tehran to continue.But EU chief diplomat Javier Solana declared...

TEHRAN A letter written by Iran's former supreme ruler, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, and published last Friday refers indirectly to Iran's needs to pursue nuclear weapons and has become part of the struggle between moderates and the military as it tries to expand its power under President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

WASHINGTON, Oct 3 (Reuters) - U.S. and world emergency crude oil reserves could replace a complete shut-off of Iranian oil exports for 18 months, avoiding an estimated $201 billion in damage to the American economy, the Government Accountability Office said on Tuesday. There has been concern among energy traders that tough action by the United States and other western countries against Iran's nuclear program could cause Tehran to retaliate by cutting off the country's oil exports. Iran is the world's fourth biggest oil exporter, selling about 2.7 million barrels a day. Such a disruption would remove close to 1.5 billion...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 2 (UPI) -- A strategic thinker who called all the correct diplomatic and military plays preceding Operation Iraqi Freedom now sees diplomatic failure and air strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities. The war on Iran, he says, started a year ago when the United States began conducting secret recon missions inside Iran. Sam Gardiner, 67, has taught strategy at the National War College, Air War College and Naval War College. The retired Air Force colonel recently published as a Century Foundation Report "The End of the 'Summer of Diplomacy': Assessing the U.S. Military Option on Iran." President Bush and...

BERLIN, Sept 23 (Reuters) - France, Britain and Germany would be willing to begin talks with Iran even if it has not suspended its nuclear enrichment programme first, but Washington would not take part, a German magazine reported on Saturday. So far Iran has refused to suspend its uranium enrichment programme, which could refine uranium for atom bombs, saying its nuclear fuel ambitions are limited to fuelling power stations. Western countries suspect Tehran wants to produce weapons. Citing unnamed German diplomatic sources, weekly Der Spiegel said the goal of this new strategy would be to lure Tehran to the negotiating...

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Iran is prepared to negotiate a suspension of its most sensitive nuclear work if it receives fair guarantees in talks with major powers, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Thursday. He said talks with the European Union on Iran's nuclear program were on the right track and he hoped no one would try to sabotage them, an apparent reference to the United States. He said talks with the European Union on Iran's nuclear program were on the right track and he hoped no one would try to sabotage them, an apparent reference to the United States....

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - President Bush accused Iran's rulers on Tuesday of using their nation's wealth to fund terrorists and nuclear arms research but said he preferred to resolve differences with Tehran diplomatically before resorting to sanctions. In a speech to the United Nations rebuffing critics of his muscular promotion of democracy in the Middle East, Bush assailed the leaders of Iran and Syria while appealing to their peoples over their heads. In a week of Muslim protests over Pope Benedict's criticism of their faith, the U.S. leader said the West was not hostile to Islam, contrary to "propaganda and...

But, Bush added, the United States was pursuing a diplomatic solution to the crisis over Iran. In a 21-minute speech to the United Nations General Assembly, Bush directly addressed the people of a number of Middle Eastern countries, saying that the United States wanted to support democratic reforms, defeat extremism and convince them it was not acting against Islam.

Ahmadinejad more generally accused the United States and Britain of manipulating the Security Council to further their own agendas. "The question needs to be asked: if the governments of the United States or the United Kingdom who are permanent members of the Security Council, commit aggression, occupation and violation of international law, which of the organs of the UN can take them to account?" he said.

Opposition: Iran Using Laser Enrichment Friday September 15, 2006 1:31 AM By EDITH M. LEDERER Associated Press Writer NEW YORK (AP) - Iran has secretly revived a program to enrich uranium using laser technology, reportedly with favorable results, an Iranian opposition figure said Thursday citing information from members of the resistance inside the country. Alireza Jafarzadeh said information about the laser enrichment program at Lashkar Ab'ad, about 15 miles northwest of Tehran, came from the same sources that led to his revelation in May 2003 that Iran had a clandestine nuclear program. There was no independent confirmation of the latest...

VIENNA, Austria - Iran is ready to consider suspending uranium enrichment for up to two months, diplomats told The Associated Press on Sunday. The diplomats, who insisted on anonymity to disclose confidential information, spoke shortly after senior Iranian and European Union diplomats held a second day of talks on Tehran's defiance of a U.N. demand that it suspend enrichment, which can be used to make nuclear arms. They said the compromise was mentioned by Ali Larijani, Tehran's chief nuclear negotiator, during his meeting with the EU's foreign policy chief, Javier Solana. One diplomat said Larijani floated the possibility of stopping...

Iran unveiled its first locally manufactured fighter plane Wednesday during large-scale military exercises, state-run television reported. The report said the bomber Saegheh is similar to the American F-18 fighter plane, but "more powerful." It also said the plane was "designed, optimized and improved by Iranian experts." State TV said the Iranian air force had commissioned the Saegheh plane after many test flights in the past year. Television footage showed the airplane taking off and launching two rockets. The plane had a small cockpit and only one pilot. "Saegheh is capable of launching both rockets and bombs," the report said. General...

Iran said on Monday it had tested a new air defense system to counter missiles and aircraft during large-scale military exercises throughout the country, state-run television reported. "The upgraded missiles successfully destroyed the presumed enemies' missiles in low altitude simultaneously in several points," said Gen. Amir Amini, deputy commander of Iran's Air Force. The television footage showed at least four surface-to-air missiles being fired from mobile launching pads. The report did not say if the missile was equipped with a guidance system. During maneuvers dubbed "The Blow of Zolfaghar," which began in August 19, Iran test fired short-range surface-to-surface and...