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Gaining Support for Action on Iran's Nuclear Program

(Washington Institute for Near East Policy) Patrick Clawson - Iran's current story is that it imported key parts for its centrifuges, blaming the presence of highly enriched (weapons-grade) uranium at the Natanz centrifuge plant on contaminated foreign (i.e., Pakistani) equipment. But the story may be a cover-up: it is not clear that Iran could actually obtain key Pakistani nuclear equipment, given that Pakistani-Iranian relations have not been close and that Pakistan has many reasons to be cautious about exporting such material. The true story may be the older Iranian account, according to which Iran developed the centrifuge technology on its own, using Pakistani blueprints. This scenario would be at least as troubling, because the presence of highly enriched uranium would mean that Iran has already begun to enrich uranium up to weapons grade.
2003-09-11 00:00:00
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