After announcing construction on two new nuclear facilities in a southeast region on the Indian Ocean late last month, Iran continues to seek new nuclear sites after the nuclear deal that was struck last month.
Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) deputy chief and spokesperson Behrouz Kamalvandi on Tuesday revealed that his organization is currently holding negotiations with China to build several additional nuclear reactors, reports the semi-official Fars News Agency.
“Talks are underway between Iran and China on building ACP100 small reactors and whenever we achieve results we will publicize it,” Kamalvandi said, expressing his hopes that a bilateral agreement on the reactors will be signed soon.
The nuclear deal, which China was a partner to, stipulates that Iran will not build any new uranium enrichment facilities for a period of 15 years. While Iran’s new nuclear plants will not necessarily be used to enrich uranium – although they will at the least require enriched uranium in order to operate – Iran has a long history of lying about the military aspects of its nuclear program.
Ascertaining the usage of the new plants will be made all the more difficult because the deal gives Iran 24 days before any inspection.
The ACP100 nuclear reactors that Iran plans to purchase are a Chinese model that is installed underground according to the report.
Back in April, Kamalvandi spoke about the two nuclear reactors to be built in the southeast whose construction plans were announced last month, and revealed that the AEOI is also seeking to build large nuclear power plants.
At the same time he noted that “at present, the world is moving towards the construction of small power plants since they can have different applications.”
The AEOI spokesperson added that two or three small nuclear plants can be built one next to the other to construct a medium size power plant.
Last December, Kamalvandi announced that AEOI had begun construction on two new nuclear power plants in Bushehr province in Iran’s south.
“We have entered the executive phase of the construction of these two nuclear power plants based on the contract signed between Tehran and Moscow in March to construct the plants,” he said.
The Iran deal has the Islamic regime inspecting its own covert Parchin nuclear site, which Iran has admitted to using to test exploding bridge wire nuclear detonators and has refused requests by international inspectors to see the site.
