Iran says it produced nuclear fuel pellets

Pellets for use in heavy water reactor, which could be used for plutonium

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updated 10:03 p.m. ET Nov. 24, 2007

TEHRAN, Iran - The head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization said Saturday that the country had produced its first nuclear fuel pellets for use in a heavy water reactor, which is still under construction.

The uranium oxide pellets are made using a process separate from the uranium enrichment at the heart of a standoff between Iran and the U.S., which accuses the clerical government of secretly pursuing a nuclear weapons program.

But the Arak reactor, which began construction in central Iran in 2004, is a concern to the West because the spent fuel from a heavy-water facility can be used to produce plutonium, which in turn can be used for a nuclear weapon. U.N. inspectors last visited the reactor in July, and Iran has said it hopes to have Arak up and running by 2009.

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“Fuel pellets to be used in the 40-megawatt Arak research reactor have been produced,” Iranian Vice President Gholam Reza Aghazadeh said, according to the official IRNA news agency.

Iran is developing Arak parallel to its better-known light-water reactor program, like the one being built with Russian help at Bushehr. Such light-water reactors use enriched uranium that, at far higher levels of enrichment, can also be used to produce the fissile material for a nuclear weapon.

Iran insists its nuclear program is solely for peaceful purposes including generating electricity.

The U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, had no comment Saturday.