A fire that broke out at Natanz’s Iranian nuclear facility last week caused significant damage that could delay the development of advanced centrifuges, an Iranian nuclear official said Sunday.
No one was injured in the mysterious fire last Thursday at the site, Behrouz Kamalvandi said, spokesperson for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran.
Iran’s top security body said Friday the cause of the fire in the facilities It had been determined and would be announced later, however, specific details have yet to be released.
Some Iranian officials reportedly said it may have been caused by cyber sabotage, and one warned that Tehran would retaliate against any country carrying out such attacks.
“The incident could delay the development and production of advanced centrifuges in the medium term.” Kamalvandi Was quoted as saying by Iran state news agency IRNA.
“Iran will replace the damaged building with a larger one that has more advanced equipment.” The incident has caused significant damage, but there were no victims. “
An IRNA article last week addressed what he called the possibility of sabotage by enemies like Israel and the United States, although he did not directly charge them.
In 2010, the Stuxnet computer virus, believed to have been developed by the US and Israel, was discovered after it was used to attack Natanz.
Israel’s defense minister said Sunday that he was not “necessarily” behind every mysterious incident in Iran.
The largely underground Natanz uranium enrichment site is one of several Iranian facilities monitored by inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog.
The IAEA said Friday that the location of the fire did not contain nuclear material and that none of its inspectors was present at the time.
Intensified sanctions
Natanz is the centerpiece of Iran’s enrichment program, which Tehran says is for peaceful purposes only. Western intelligence agencies and the IAEA believe it had a clandestine, coordinated nuclear weapons program that it stopped in 2003.
Tehran denies seeking nuclear weapons.
Iran agreed to halt its nuclear program in exchange for the removal of most international sanctions in an agreement reached between Tehran and six world powers in 2015.
But Tehran has gradually reduced its commitments to the deal since the administration of United States President Donald Trump withdrew from the deal in 2018 and reimposed and intensified sanctions that have hit Iran’s economy.
The deal only allows Iran to enrich uranium at the Natanz facility with more than 5,000 first-generation IR-1 centrifuges.
.
