The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Grossi, said in Vienna on Wednesday that Iran had secretly modified the Fordow facility to produce highly enriched uranium, violating its obligation to inform the International Atomic Energy Agency of such steps.
According to Grossi, IAEA inspectors discovered during an unannounced inspection of the Fordo nuclear facility, south of the capital, Tehran, that the enrichment machinery had been modified "significantly" since last November.
The IAEA did not say if and how the modification increased production capacity.
Reuters had revealed, quoting a confidential report of the International Atomic Energy Agency, that Iran is enriching uranium at the Fordow facility with a purity of 60%, which contradicts what it had disclosed. The report considered the Iranian move undermining the agency's ability to implement effective preventive measures at the Fordow facility.
Grossi told the European Parliament last week that Iran already has enough uranium to make several nuclear weapons if this material is further enriched. However, he stressed that Tehran still has a long way to go with technical and political hurdles before it can build such. arms.
Grossi has indicated in the past that Iran is close to the level of enrichment by 90% needed to produce nuclear weapons, while Iranian politicians have asserted for years that they do not want to build nuclear weapons.
Missing information
A spokesman for Iran's Atomic Energy Agency, Behrouz Kamalvandi, responded that the report issued by the International Atomic Energy Agency indicates that its director general, Rafael Grossi, has incomplete and out-of-date information.
The Iranian official explained that one of the IAEA inspectors inadvertently reported that Iran had made unannounced changes at the Fordow site, and confirmed that previous inspectors were present at the site, and that after the explanations given to them, the inspector realized his mistake.
Kamalvandi concluded that after coordination with the IAEA's General Secretariat, the issue was resolved, and stressed that Tehran sent yesterday, Wednesday, a message to the IAEA in response to its previous letter in this regard.
In a related context, the head of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, Mohammad Eslami, said that his country has good defense systems and the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization is taking the necessary measures to face any challenges.
Islamic added, in a statement after a meeting of the Iranian government, that Western countries adopt Israel's positions on the Iranian nuclear file, stressing that these are subversive moves that Tehran is not affected by, as he put it.
Iran pledged in 2015 to curb its nuclear programme.
In return, Western sanctions were lifted.
After Washington unilaterally withdrew from the agreement, Tehran gradually backed away from the restrictions.
Negotiations to revive the nuclear deal have been frozen for months.