nuclear-news

Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran’s ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency, said last week’s visit to Iranian nuclear facilities by IAEA Deputy Director General Herman Nackaerts showed Tehran’s “100 percent transparency and openness.”

Nackaerts, head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog’s safeguards department, spent five days in Iran on a visit that coincided with a new push by Russiato revive deadlocked diplomatic talks between Tehran and six major powers.

Western nations suspect Iran is trying to use its nuclear program to develop atomic weapons. The Islamic Republic has denied the charge, saying it wants to produce nuclear energy……

The IAEA confirmed that Nackaerts had been in Iran but gave no details of his trip. His department is responsible for checking that nuclear material is not used for weapons.

Earlier this year, the IAEA said it had been trying since early 2008 to gain access to sites linked to the manufacture of machines used to refine uranium, but Iran had ignored all requests.

Nackaerts’ predecessor, Olli Heinonen, said the last time the agency visited a research and development facility for centrifuges was when he and then-IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei went to a site in Tehran in 2008.

It was unclear whether Nackaerts visited the same place……

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/23/us-iran-nuclear-idUSTRE77M6ZW20110823