The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was satisfied with a visit to a Brazilian uranium enrichment plant even though inspectors were not allowed to see centrifuges, Brazilian officials said Wednesday. Defence Minister Jose Viegas said that Brazilian authorities had offered the IAEA guarantees that "no nuclear material is being diverted" in Brazil. Three IAEA inspectors were allowed into the plant at Resende and allowed to observe tubes going in and out from the centrifuges but not the centrifuges. The IAEA inspectors made no remarks to the press. "Brazil has nothing to hide in terms of the use of nuclear material and never refused to open the installations at Resende or any other facility for inspection," Viegas said. Science Minister Eduardo Campos said that Brasilia is awaiting a final decision from the IAEA about whether its conditions for inspections at the Resende plant are acceptable. "Now we shut up and wait for the agency ... (to) announce an opinion about the work of Brazilian technicians," he said. The agency has argued for unfettered access to the plant, which has not begun production, but Brazil has said that it wants to protect the technology it claims to have developed to enrich uranium less expensively than existing methods.
