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Taipei smugglers facilitate Iran nukes
G2 BULLETIN
Key pieces of equipment purchased from Europe, shipped to Tehran
Editor’s Note: The following report is excerpted from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin, the premium online newsletter published by the founder of WND. Subscriptions are $99 a year or, for monthly trials, just $9.95 per month for credit card users, and provide instant access for the complete reports.
LONDON – British MI6 intelligence agency investigators have discovered Iran has set up a new smuggling network in Taiwan to obtain specialized equipment used for the production of nuclear weapons, according to a report from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin.
Insiders report Iran has established companies to buy the equipment on the world markets and then smuggle it into Tehran.
The purchases have involved pressure transducers, which are used to produce weapons-grade uranium, and Secret Intelligence Service officers have established that nuclear scientists from Tehran have held meetings in Taiwan’s capital, Taipei, to buy the units.
The equipment is stored by the companies in a high-security area on the island.
The companies are fronted by local Chinese businessmen, and MI6 officers believe some of them have worked in China‘s own nuclear industry before moving to Taiwan. The intelligence officers have also traced bank accounts held by the businessmen to banks in the Cayman Islands.
Keep in touch with the most important breaking news stories about critical developments around the globe with Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin, the premium, online intelligence news source edited and published by the founder of WND.
“It suggests that they are almost certainly well paid for the work on behalf of Iran,” said a senior intelligence source in London.
Iran has been trying to acquire the equipment for more than a year. But Russia and European companies refused to sell Tehran the transducers.
Now China has joined in refusing to sell such specialized technology after Beijing supported a censure motion passed by the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna last month following the revelation that Tehran was building a second uranium enrichment facility at Qom.
At the end of this month, the U.N. will be asked to impose a new round of sanctions against Iran unless it agrees to abandon its nuclear program.
A report passed on by MI6 to the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna last week revealed Iran had already acquired 100 transducers from Taiwan.
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Iran building backup nuke plant in Americas?
WND
Venezuelan site could give Hezbollah door to atomic mischief
Editor’s Note: The following report is excerpted from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin, the premium online newsletter published by the founder of WND. Subscriptions are $99 a year or, for monthly trials, just $9.95 per month for credit card users, and provide instant access for the complete reports.
Iran may consider a proposal from Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to build a backup “nuclear village” in his nation to produce nuclear energy and also to have a safe fall-back production capability in case there is an attack by Israel or the United States on nuclear facilities in Iran, according to a report from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin.
Chavez, in a visit last week to Iran, proposed to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the idea of building a project in Venezuela.
Security sources have confirmed such a “nuclear village” could become the Iranian nuclear production alternative, or a location to hide especially critical nuclear components from attack.
With the United Nations about ready to take up the issue of sanctions against Iran over its nuclear enrichment efforts, such a prospect of attack, particularly from Israel, is increasingly likely. Israeli officials have stated on numerous occasions that a nuclear Iran would threaten Israel’s existence.
While the U.N. is expected to consider proposals for sanctions on Iran, there is an expectation that Russia and China will reject further sanctions. If that happens, security experts believe that Israel then could declare diplomacy a failure, opening the way for its long-intimated attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.
The issue of nuclear cooperation between Iran and Venezuela arose in the context of military and security cooperation agreements reached between their two leaders.
Keep in touch with the most important breaking news stories about critical developments around the globe with Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin, the premium, online intelligence news source edited and published by the founder of WND.
France was quick to object to any nuclear cooperation, saying that it would violate various United Nations resolutions, including U.N. Security Council Resolution 1737. That resolution calls for all U.N. members to refrain from the direct or indirect purchase of nuclear-related technology from Iran.
Iran and Venezuela are signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, or NPT, and their legislatures have ratified it, compelling their compliance. At the same time, it allows them to undertake a peaceful nuclear development program.
The purpose of the NPT is to allow for the promotion of cooperation in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy while trying to prevent nuclear weapons proliferation. The NPT is the only binding commitment in a multilateral treaty to disarmament by nuclear countries.
To date, some 187 countries are signatories to the NPT. It offers a safeguard system under the International Atomic Energy Agency, or IAEA, to verify treaty compliance through inspections. At the same time, it promotes equal access to nuclear technology.
Security experts believe, however, that efforts to insure effective Iranian compliance with the NPT or the U.N. resolutions would be difficult given the need for policing and investigation, something which most countries are not equipped to undertake and may not have the political will to do.
Iranian interest in nuclear cooperation with Venezuela has come up in the past. In 2006, Ahmadinejad and Chavez voiced the need for similar cooperation. At the time, Iranian parliament speaker Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel said that Iran would study the possibility.
For the complete report and full immediate access to Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin, subscribe now.
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Ahmadinejad says he won’t rule out an Iran nuclear bomb
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR
Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad‘s comments coincide with report that IAEA withheld evidence about Iran‘s nuclear weapon capabilities
In a rare interview with Western media, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that Iran has no need for nuclear weapons, but he did not rule out the possibility that Iran might develop them in the future. The broadcasting of Mr. Ahmadinejad’s remarks coincided with a new report, based on previously undisclosed information, that the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog has withheld evidence about how close Iran is to making a nuclear bomb.
In excerpts of an interview aired Thursday night on NBC News, Ahmadinejad said that “the enrichment of uranium for peaceful purposes… will never be closed down here in Iran.” When interviewer Ann Curry asked whether Iran would ever develop a nuclear weapon, Ahmadinejad said Iran had no need for such weapons.
“If nuclear weapons were influential, they would have prevented the downfall of the Soviet Union — for that matter, the downfall of the Zionist regime,” he said, referring to Israel, long believed to possess 200 nuclear weapons. “Our people have never had a need for nuclear weapons.”
“So, may I assume, then, your answer to that question is ‘no’?” Curry asked.
Again, Ahmadinejad said: “We don’t need such — we don’t have a such a need, nuclear weapons. We don’t need nuclear weapons. Without such weapons, we are very much able to defend ourselves.”
Curry pressed Ahmadinejad again on the question, noting that “people will remark that you did not say no.” He replied, “You can take from this whatever you want, madam.” Further excerpts of the interview, which was taped a week previously in Tehran, ran Friday morning. The full interview is to be aired Sunday afternoon.
Ahmadinejad’s refusal to rule out Iran building a nuclear weapon comes just a day after President Barack Obama announced plans to scrap the Bush administration’s missile shield plan in favor of a new system which would better deal with short- and medium-ranged missiles launched from Iran. President Bush‘s plan would have placed interceptors in Poland and the Czech Republic to defend against long-range Iranian missiles targeting Europe.
Also on Thursday, the Associated Press released a report that experts at the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN’s nuclear watchdog, believe that Iran is currently capable of building a nuclear weapon. The AP based their report on a confidential document titled “Possible Military Dimension of Iran’s Nuclear Program,” which was written by senior IAEA officials.
The information in the document that is either new, more detailed or represents a more forthright conclusion than found in published IAEA reports includes:
– The IAEA’s assessment that Iran worked on developing a chamber inside a ballistic missile capable of housing a warhead payload “that is quite likely to be nuclear.”
– That Iran engaged in “probable testing” of explosives commonly used to detonate a nuclear warhead — a method known as a “full-scale hemispherical explosively driven shock system.”
– An assessment that Iran worked on developing a system “for initiating a hemispherical high explosive charge” of the kind used to help spark a nuclear blast.
In another key finding, an excerpt notes: “The agency … assesses that Iran has sufficient information to be able to design and produce a workable implosion nuclear device (an atomic bomb) based on HEU (highly enriched uranium) as the fission fuel.”
These details add significantly to previous reports on Iran’s nuclear capability, as summarized this summer in a Monitor briefing, ‘How close is Iran to a bomb?’
The AP writes that two international officials confirmed the authenticity of the document, though they insisted on anonymity because the document was meant only to be seen by top IAEA officials.
The IAEA denied that it was hiding evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program, calling such an idea “politically motivated and baseless,” Reuters reports. In a statement commenting on the AP story, the IAEA said that it “has no concrete proof that there is or has been a nuclear weapons programme in Iran.”
Reuters also writes that Israel, which has typically been highly vocal about the threat of a nuclear Iran, may be changing its message. Ehud Barak, Israel’s minister of defense, said that even if Iran had nuclear weapons, it would not be able to defeat Israel.
“Right now, Iran does not have a bomb. Even if it did, this would not make it a threat to Israel’s existence. Israel can lay waste to Iran,” Barak said in a transcript of a newspaper interview obtained by Reuters before publication Friday.
Israeli leaders have repeatedly sounded alarms over Iran’s atomic ambitions, pointing at President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s calls for the Jewish state to be “wiped off the map” and support for Islamist guerrilla groups arrayed along Israel’s borders.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a right-winger who brought the centre-left Barak into his coalition government, said he saw “eye to eye” with the Defence minister – signalling a possible change in Israel’s official rhetoric as world powers prepare to revive diplomatic engagement with Iran next month.
Reuters adds that Mr. Netanyahu issued a supportive response to Mr. Barak’s comments, saying “I think that what the Defence minister wanted to say, something that I believe, is that the State of Israel will be able to defend itself in any situation.”
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U.N. accused of hiding Iran nuke evidence
WND
Atomic energy chief ElBaradei not trusted by Western diplomats
By Jerome R. Corsi
Mohamed ElBaradei
NEW YORK – The International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nation’s nuclear watchdog agency, has been accused by senior Western diplomats and Israeli officials of hiding new evidence that Iran is developing a nuclear weapons program.
American, French, British and German senior officials charge the IAEA’s out-going director, Mohamed ElBaradei, hid new evidence of Iran’s nuclear weapons program that was submitted to the IAEA in a classified report, according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.NEW YORK – The International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nation’s nuclear watchdog agency, has been accused by senior Western diplomats and Israeli officials of hiding new evidence that Iran is developing a nuclear weapons program.
The report was written by IAEA inspectors in Iran and signed by the head of the agency’s team in the country.
In Israel, an effort to force the release of the allegedly censored report is being handled by Shaul Horev, director general of the Israel Atomic Energy Commission, and by the Foreign Ministry.
Order Jerome Corsi‘s “Why Israel Can’t Wait: The Coming War between Israel and Iran” exclusively for your Kindle from Amazon today.
“Israel and other Western countries lost confidence in ElBaradei years ago,” Haaretz correspondent Yossi Melman wrote in a separate commentary. “As a result, Israel, the United States and Britain have all refused to give the IAEA sensitive intelligence, for fear that ElBaradei would leak it to Iran, thereby exposing their intelligence gathering methods and their sources.”
Melman further noted that Israel has no confidence in Yukiya Amano, the Japanese diplomat selected to replace ElBaradei at the IAEA, largely because Amano has reiterated ElBaradei’s stance that the IAEA has no evidence to support the claim that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.
A May 2009 Senate Foreign Relations Committee report issued by the committee’s Democratic chairman Sen. John Kerry, entitled “Iran: Where We Are Today,” reported: “Potentially damning evidence surfaced in 2004 when U.S. intelligence obtained a laptop computer from an Iranian engineer.”
“The computer contained thousands of pages of data on tests of high explosives and designs for a missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead,” the report said. “It also contained videos of what were described as secret workshops around Iran where the weapons work was supposedly carried out.”
The Senate report also pointed out that the Iranians denounced the computer documents as “fakes.”
Still, senior U.N. officials and intelligence officers who saw the documents told the committee staff “the documents come from more than just the laptop and appear to be authentic, right down to the names, addresses and telephone numbers of the workshops in Iran.”
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee concluded “Iran has moved closer to completing the three components for a nuclear weapon – fissile material, warhead design and delivery system.”
Obama’s assessment
President Obama has left no doubt the White House has concluded Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons.
On Nov. 7, 2008, in his first press conference after winning the presidential election, Obama said, “Iran’s development of a nuclear weapon, I believe, is unacceptable. And we have to mount an international effort to prevent that from happening.”
In the press availability following Obama’s meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on May 18,, the president said, “I indicated to Prime Minister Netanyahu in private what I have said publicly, which is that Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon would not only be a threat to Israel and a threat to the United States, but would be profoundly destabilizing in the international community as a whole and could set off a nuclear-arms race in the Middle East that would be extraordinarily dangerous for all concerned, including for Iran.”
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Israel concerned over US “umbrella” on Iran
JERUSALEM – A series of failed tests of a joint U.S.-Israel anti-missile system raised new questions Thursday about the U.S. goal of providing an “umbrella” to defend its allies against an Iranian nuclear attack.
The technological setbacks also drew renewed attention to Israel’s concerns about a nuclear-armed Iran and the possibility that it might lean further in the direction of a go-it alone strike against the country’s atomic facilities.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s offer this week of a “defense umbrella” over its Gulf Arab allies to prevent Tehran from dominating the region “once they have a nuclear weapon” was widely seen in Israel as an acceptance of a nuclear-armed Iran. She later tried to dispel that view, but her comments sparked criticism by Israeli officials.
Israel considers Iran its most dangerous enemy because of its nuclear program, long-range missile development and repeated references by its president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to Israel’s destruction. Iran has insisted that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes, but Israel and the U.S. reject that.
Adding to the urgency was word Wednesday from the head of the Russian nuclear agency that Iran’s new atomic power plant will be switched on later this year.
For a decade, Israel has been presenting its “Arrow” anti-missile system, developed and jointly funded with the U.S., as an answer to medium-range Iranian missiles that might carry nuclear warheads. Tested repeatedly, the Arrow system has often succeeded in intercepting dummy incoming missiles, to great fanfare.
But just as Clinton worried Israelis by speaking of an umbrella over U.S. allies threatened by Iran, word came of three test failures in the Arrow system over the past week. The latest was in California, where a test was aborted before the Arrow missile could be launched because of a communications failure, according to Israeli defense officials speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to disclose details of the tests.
Experts played down the importance of the failures. “Arrow has had a pretty successful test program,” said John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org. “I wouldn’t be overly concerned about a problem like this.”
Uzi Rubin, former director of the Arrow project, agreed. “It’s really not a very serious glitch in the system that would require going back to the drawing board,” he said.
But the failures underlined the complexity of the whole anti-missile concept, which has been compared to throwing a rock in the air and trying to hit it with another rock. Israeli media personalities wondered if any system could protect Israel if multiple rockets were fired together.
If Clinton’s “umbrella” offer, made in a television interview in Thailand, was meant to reassure nervous Israelis, it had the opposite effect.
Dan Meridor, Israel’s minister of intelligence and atomic energy, was critical of Clinton’s implications.
He said it appeared “as if they have already come to terms with a nuclear Iran. I think that’s a mistake.” He told Army Radio, “I think that at this time it is correct not to deal with the assumption that Iran will obtain nuclear capability, but to prevent that from happening.”
Ever since President Barack Obama took office with a pledge to explore diplomatic contacts with Iran, Israeli officials have voiced concerns that talks would give Iran more time to develop nuclear weapons. Israelis have also suspected that the Obama administration was planning for a future Mideast that included a nuclear-armed Iran – something Israel would consider a threat to its existence.
Hours after Meridor spoke, Clinton clarified her remarks, saying she was “not suggesting any new policy” on Iran and continued to believe that “Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons is unacceptable.”
U.S. officials have not defined what Clinton meant by her original “umbrella” comment.
Analysts offered two contrasting explanations: a threat of retaliation for any Iranian nuclear strike, or supplying U.S. allies with defense systems aimed at preventing such an attack.
The umbrella formulation did not appear to include Israel, though about 150 American soldiers have been training with Israeli soldiers in the southern Negev desert for several months on advanced radar installations that could be used in missile defense, according to Israeli officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the project.
Israel has pointedly not taken the option of a military strike off the table, recalling Israel’s lightning 1981 airstrike that destroyed Iraq’s nuclear reactor.
Experts doubt Israel has the capability of wiping out all of Iran’s nuclear facilities, which are said to be scattered around the country, some of them hidden. But hitting well chosen targets could set back Iran’s nuclear ambitions for years.
Political analyst Gerald Steinberg, a professor at Israel’s Bar Ilan University, said a perception that the U.S. was backing away from preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons “could add to Israeli decision makers’ concerns that the U.S. isn’t going to take action, and so Israel should.”
But Israel has not broadcast an urge to attack. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has long urged concerted international action, including tougher sanctions, and hard-line Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman has said that Israel would not attack Iran just to do the work of others.
Lieberman is visiting South America, and the Foreign Ministry spokesman in Jerusalem refused to comment on the issue of the “umbrella.”
Associated Press writers Ian Deitch and Jen Thomas contributed to this report.
Clinton: U.S. Will Extend ‘Defense Umbrella’ Over Gulf if Iran Obtains Nuclear Weapons
FOX NEWS
Secretary of state warns Iran that the United States would extend a “defense umbrella” over its allies in the Persian Gulf if the Islamic Republic obtains a nuclear weapons capability.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned Iran Wednesday that the United States would extend a “defense umbrella” over its allies in the Persian Gulf if the Islamic Republic obtains a nuclear weapons capability.
Appearing on a Thai TV program, Clinton said the U.S. would also take steps to “upgrade the defense” of America’s Gulf allies in such an event, a reference to stepped-up military aid to those countries.
Clinton’s reference to a U.S. “defense umbrella” over the Persian Gulf represented a potentially significant evolution in America’s global defense posture. Washington already explicitly maintains a “nuclear umbrella” over Asian allies like Japan and South Korea, but seldom, if ever, has any senior U.S. official publicly discussed the concept in relation to the Gulf.
The secretary’s remarks also suggested the course the Obama administration might pursue if, as many analysts predict, an unchecked Iran succeeds in obtaining a nuclear weapons capability before President Obama’s term expires — in effect, how the United States might live with a nuclear-armed Iran. Clinton’s comments evoked a vision of the U.S. countering such a threat by bolstering regional defenses and reminding Iran of the dangers of mutually assured destruction — but not by seeking regime change in Iran or by taking military action to destroy the country’s nuclear apparatus.
“We want Iran to calculate what I think is a fair assessment that if the United States extends a defense umbrella over the region, if we do even more to support the military capacity of those in the Gulf, it’s unlikely that Iran will be any stronger or safer because they won’t be able to intimidate and dominate as they apparently believe they can once they have a nuclear weapon,” Clinton said.
A senior aide to Clinton, speaking to reporters on background while the secretary’s traveling party flew from Bangkok to Phuket, said Clinton’s comments did not reflect her acceptance of a nuclear-armed Iran nor a literal accounting of what the U.S. would do if Tehran did acquire nuclear weapons.
Rather, the aide said, the secretary was only articulating what arguments the Obama administration makes to influence Iran’s calculus. The aide also said Clinton’s use of the term “defense umbrella” was not synonymous with the term “nuclear umbrella,” even though the context of her comments centered on Iran’s potential acquisition of nuclear weapons.
In Jerusalem, though, Dan Meridor, Israel’s Minister of Intelligence and Atomic Energy, told Army Radio: “I was not thrilled to hear the American statement from yesterday that they will protect their allies with a nuclear umbrella, as if they have already come to terms with a nuclear Iran. I think that’s a mistake.”
Asked about the Obama administration’s attempts to engage Iran, Clinton said she “had hoped we would get a positive response … but then their elections happened.” Clinton told her Thai TV interviewers there was “no doubt” that “irregularities” occurred in Iran’s disputed presidential election and that the regime then “brutally repressed” those citizens that protested the announced outcome.
Because of these events, the secretary said, the Iranian regime has been “preoccupied” and thus not responded to American overtures. “The nuclear clock is ticking,” she said, noting that Tehran has continued to pursue its nuclear programs and adding that the U.S. and its allies in the nuclear diplomacy surrounding Iran “will not keep the window open forever.” She repeated previous pledges to work to impose “crippling” sanctions if Iran does not halt its enrichment of uranium.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
‘Germany believes Iran could have nuclear bomb within 6 months’
HAARETZ
By Assaf Uni,
Iran is capable of assembling an atomic bomb within six months, German intelligence analysts told the German weekly newsmagazine Stern.
“If they want to, they will be able to set off a uranium bomb within six months,” an analyst with Germany’s intelligence service, Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), told the magazine.
German intelligence officials told Stern believe Iran has “mastered” every stage of uranium enrichment and that they have activated enough centrifuges to produce sufficient quantities of weapons-grade uranium for at least one atomic bomb.
“Nobody would have thought this possible some years ago,” an intelligence official told Stern.
The UN Security Council has imposed three sets of sanctions on Tehran for defying its demands to suspend uranium enrichment.
Some analysts say Iran may be close to having the required material for producing a bomb, but most say the weaponization process would then take one to two years due to technical and political hurdles.
“Weaponizing” enrichment would not escape the notice of UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), unless it was done at a secret location.
Until now there have been no indications of any such covert diversion, a point made by the IAEA’s incoming director-general shortly after his election earlier this month.
Current IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei has said it is his “gut feeling” that Iran is seeking at least the capability to build nuclear weapons, in order to protect itself from perceived regional and U.S. threats.
Libyan leader: Peaceful nuclear program should be encouraged
Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi says Iran should be encouraged to pursue its nuclear program as long as it is for peaceful purposes.
Gadhafi was addressing Wednesday’s opening session of a summit of the Non-Aligned Movement at the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheik. The 118-nation group includes Iran.
He said it is “unjust” to stop Iran from enriching uranium for peaceful purposes, but that it must not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons.
The United States and Israel say Iran is seeking to acquire nuclear weapons. Iran denies the charge, saying its program is for generating power.
Libya in 2003 abandoned its own program to develop nuclear and chemical weapons.
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Exiles Accuse Iran of Working On Detonators
Sep 28
Posted by Chris Thomas
Washington Post
By Edward Cody
PARIS, Sept. 24 — An Iranian exile group said Thursday that it has identified two previously unknown sites in and near Tehran where it says Iranian scientists are researching and trying to manufacture detonators for nuclear weapons.
The allegation, from the Paris-based Mujaheddin-e Khalq, or MEK, was designed to reinforce the exiles’ long-standing contention that the Iranian government, despite repeated denials, has an active program to develop a nuclear arsenal under the aegis of the Defense Ministry and the Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The announcement was timed to coincide with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad‘s appearance at the U.N. General Assembly and with intensified pressure from the United States and other major powers for Iran to allow full inspection of its nuclear-related facilities by the International Atomic Energy Agency.
There was no way to confirm the authenticity of Thursday’s allegation. But previous MEK information has given Western intelligence agencies tips about some Iranian nuclear activities or provided details about research sites.
Mehdi Abrishamchi, an MEK activist, said that as far as he knew, no Western governments were aware of the existence of the two sites.
As did Ahmadinejad in interviews Wednesday, Iran repeatedly has denied a desire to acquire nuclear weapons and says its nuclear program is for peaceful energy use. According to statements from Iranian officials, activities connected to making nuclear weapons were halted several years ago.
But Abrishamchi said the two sites house programs designed to research and produce high-explosive detonators for atomic bombs.
The information came from “dozens of sources at different levels of the Iranian regime’s various organs” and was cross-checked with dozens more, he said in a statement.
Abrishamchi, a senior member of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, an MEK-run umbrella group, said the two sites were part of a complex known as METFAZ — the Farsi acronym for Research Center for Explosion and Impact — that apparently has been in operation for several years under the command of the Defense Ministry.
The first site, a research and administrative facility in eastern Tehran, was bought by the Defense Ministry under the name of Massoud Sadighi Divani, a senior ministry official, Abrishamchi said. Inside, scientists carry out computer simulations and other experiments to reach an effective design for high-explosive impact and penetration devices that could serve to detonate a nuclear weapon, he said.
The second site, about 20 miles to the east, is used to manufacture parts needed to construct the detonators, he said. Lying within a military zone with restricted access, it is surrounded by high concrete walls and includes tunnels dug into a nearby hill, he added.
Abrishamchi said the two sites basically continue work that was being done at Shian, a facility that was razed by Iranian authorities after being denounced by the MEK in 2003. He called on the International Atomic Energy Agency to try to inspect the sites as quickly as possible.
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