TEHRAN: Iran's atomic chief Ali Akbar Salehi declared in a report Saturday that Iran is now capable of making its own nuclear fuel plates and rods, technology the West says Tehran does not possess. Salehi said the country has completed the construction of a facility in the central city of Isfahan to produce the plates and rods required to power nuclear reactors. “We have built an advanced manufacturing unit in the Isfahan site for the fuel plates,” Salehi told Fars news agency in what was said to be an exclusive interview. “A grand transformation has taken place in the production of (nuclear) plates and rods. With the completion of the unit in Isfahan, we are one of the few countries which can produce fuel rods and fuel plates.” Salehi said that Western policies had spurred on Tehran to reach its current level of atomic technology, including the production of nuclear plates and rods. It was “because of West's actions that we came to this point,” he said. “What we say is based on reality and truth. There is no exaggeration or deception in our work. It is them who do not want to believe that Iran has no intention but to obtain nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.” The West led by the United States suspects that Iran's nuclear program masks a weapons drive, a charge Tehran vehemently denies. Salehi also said Tehran has increased the stockpile of uranium it began enriching to higher levels last year in defiance of the UN demands to halt the program. He said Iran now has 40 kilograms of uranium enriched to 20 percent. Iran reported a stockpile of 30 kilograms in October. Salehi said, meanwhile, that work on Iran's second uranium enrichment plant at Fordo, in the country's southwest, was progressing.
