Iran Nuclear Issue

http://www.nti.org/country-profiles/iran/nuclear/

Iran's interest in nuclear technology dates to the 1950's, when the Shah of Iran began receiving assistance through the U.S. Atoms for Peace program. Although Iran signed the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) as a non-nuclear weapon state in 1968 and ratified it in 1970, the Shah may have had nuclear weapons ambitions. However, the 1979 Iranian Revolution and subsequent Iran-Iraq war limited the nuclear program's expansion. In the 1990's Iran began pursuing an indigenous nuclear fuel cycle capability by developing a uranium mining infrastructure and experimenting with uranium conversion and enrichment.

In 2002 and 2003, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, an opposition group based in Paris, revealed the existence of undeclared nuclear facilities at Arak and Natanz. Iran then admitted to small-scale enrichment experiments and plans to construct an enrichment facility, a heavy water production plant, a heavy water-moderated research reactor, and a fuel fabrication facility. Iran suspended its enrichment and conversion activities in 2003, but resumed uranium conversion in 2005, and started enrichment in 2006, increasing the enrichment level to almost 20% in 2010. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors found Iran in non-compliance with its Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement, and the UN Security Council has passed seven resolutions demanding that Iran halt its enrichment and reprocessing activities. Tehran insists that possession of nuclear fuel cycle capabilities is its inalienable right and continues to enrich uranium.

Дата добавления: 2015-10-02