An official of the International Atomic Energy Agency has been given a tour of Iran's main atomic sites, including access to a facility for developing advanced uranium enrichment machines and a heavy water reaction plant.
“Last week, a delegation from the International Atomic Energy Agency led by Herman Nackaerts and his deputies visited Iran’s nuclear sites. The visit came following Iran’s invitation,” the Iranian ambassador to the IAEA, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, told the semi-official Iranian Students’ New Agency.
Nackaerts, the IAEA deputy director general, spent five days in the country. Soltanieh said allowing access to nuclear facilities showed Tehran’s “100 per cent transparency and openness”.
Iran has been criticised in the past for not allowing the agency access to nuclear sites, and is under four sets of UN Security Council sanctions because of its refusal to suspend its uranium enrichment activities and its heavy water reactor programme.
Heavy water reactors produce plutonium which, along with enriched uranium, can be used for the fissile core of nuclear warheads.
Iran denies intending to use the enriched uranium for anything other than powering its research reactors.
“A one-off openness isn’t enough,” a European diplomat told Chinese newspaper China Daily. “I would be amazed if they are changing their policy radically.”