[PEN-L:33121] proliferations.................................

["Ian Murray" <seamus2001@xxxxxxxxx>]

[ I went to college with GK's brother..........]


Nuclear Sites In Iran Worry U.S. Officials
White House Cites 'Pursuit of Weapons'

By Glenn Kessler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, December 14, 2002; Page A18


The White House expressed "serious concerns" yesterday about the
construction of two nuclear facilities in Iran that officials say is
part of a clandestine weapons program, adding to the growing list of
nuclear headaches for the Bush administration.

The disclosure of the plants -- which appear designed to produce
enriched uranium or plutonium, the fissile material needed for
weapons -- came in the same week that North Korea announced it would
restart a shuttered nuclear plant and the United States moved closer to
confrontation with Iraq over its weapons programs.

White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said the Iranian facilities
reinforce growing U.S. fears about Iran's "across-the-board pursuit of
weapons of mass destruction and missile capabilities."

Despite the rising consternation about Iran's weapons programs,
administration officials said yesterday they will keep their focus on
the dispute with Iraq. They believe Iraq poses the greater threat, in
part because of what they believe are stocks of chemical and biological
weapons.

In an interview with CNN yesterday, however, the director general of the
International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohamed El Baradei, said that in
terms of the technical capability needed to produce nuclear weapons, he
would rank North Korea and Iran ahead of Iraq.

U.S. officials said they will press for prompt inspections of the
Iranian facilities and urge other nations to stop cooperating with Iran
on nuclear matters. Officials were similarly restrained about North
Korea's announcement, avoiding saber rattling as they embarked on a
round of new diplomacy to isolate the regime.

Iranian officials yesterday denied the plants were part of a weapons
program. They said the facilities had been fully disclosed to the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and were part of a plan to
wean Iran's dependence on its oil reserves for energy.

U.S. officials rejected those assertions. "Our assessment, when we look
at Iran, is that there is no economic gain for a country rich in oil and
gas, like Iran, to build costly indigenous nuclear fuel cycle
facilities," Fleischer said. "Iran flares off more gas every year than
the equivalent power it hopes to produce with these reactors."

State Department spokesman Richard Boucher charged that Iran "tried to
hide these important facilities" and has "repeatedly rebuffed IAEA
requests for access to the sites." IAEA officials were to have visited
the sites this week, but Iran suddenly delayed the inspections until
February.

An Iraqi opposition group in August disclosed the possible existence of
the two construction sites, and Newsday last month first reported rising
U.S. concerns about the facilities and Iranian intentions. CNN on
Thursday broadcast satellite photographs of the facilities, which were
obtained by the Institute for Science and International Security, a
research organization.

"These are certainly suspicious sites of concern," said one U.S.
intelligence official.

U.S. intelligence officials knew about, and had been monitoring, the
sites before they were revealed publicly, but they said it was
impossible to know their precise stage of development until IAEA
inspectors can get to the sites. Determining the extent of Iran's
nuclear program has been, and remains, a priority for U.S. intelligence
agencies.

In a report this week, the Institute for Science and International
Security said the satellite photos suggested that one site, in Natanz,
could be used to enrich uranium and that the other, in Arak, is a
heavy-water plant, which would be part of a plutonium program.

"By their very nature, these types of facilities are dual-use," the
report said. "They can be built as civil facilities and can be
relatively quickly converted to produce material aimed at making nuclear
weapons. Alternatively, they can be copied and built clandestinely."

In September, Iran informed the IAEA that it was pursuing a "long-term
plan" to construct "nuclear power plants and the associated technologies
such as fuel cycle" facilities. However, under its agreement with the
IAEA, Iran is not required to allow IAEA inspections until six months
before nuclear material is introduced in a facility. Iran has resisted
signing an updated agreement that would require it to inform IAEA about
any new facilities six months before construction is started.

Boucher said the satellite imagery indicated that portions of the Natanz
plant -- including a service road, several small structures and three
large structures -- were designed to be underground.

"Iran clearly intended to harden and bury that facility," he said. "That
facility was probably never intended by Iran to be a declared component
of a peaceful program; instead, Iran has been caught constructing a
secret underground site, where it could produce fissile material."

Russia has been a big supplier to the Iranian nuclear program. U.S.
officials have repeatedly pressed Russian officials to crack down on
entities and individuals who have aided Iran's nuclear efforts.

Robert J. Einhorn, the top counterproliferation expert in the Clinton
administration, said Iran's contention that it wants to develop a
"closed fuel cycle" -- meaning not only reactors but also fabricating
fuel and reprocessing fuel for reactors -- makes little sense, given the
size of the Iranian program.

"The cost of purchasing fresh reactor fuel would be a tiny fraction of
what it would cost to build fuel fabrication" facilities, given that
Iran plans only a handful of reactors, he said.

Einhorn said the United States is aware that Iran has clandestinely
tried to build its program. Iran has tried to buy a heavy-water reactor
that could be used to produce weapons-grade plutonium from four
countries, all of which turned it down, he said.

Einhorn said that Iran appeared to be hedging its bets, pursuing both
plutonium and enriched uranium as routes to nuclear weapons. He said the
big question is whether Iran has passed the point necessary to proceed
with its programs without additional outside assistance.

Staff writers Dana Priest in Washington and Karl Vick in Istanbul
contributed to this report.