Iran Has Fuel for 2 Nuclear Weapons

In their last report before the United Nations Security Council votes on sanctions against Iran, international nuclear inspectors declared Monday that Iran has amassed more than two tons of enriched uranium, an amount sufficient, with further enrichment, to feed two nuclear heads.

The toughly worded report, details aspects of the Iranian nuclear program which would render the LEU swap deal offered by the P5 + 1 some 8 months ago unattractive.

Iran had now enriched 2,427 kilograms to just over three percent level. That means shipping out 2,640 pounds (1,200 kilograms) now, as per the swap deal terms, would still leave Iran with more than enough material to make a nuclear weapon.

The NY Times cites further details from the report:

It also describes, step by step, how inspectors have been denied access to a series of facilities, and how Iran has refused to answer inspectors’ questions on a variety of activities, including what the agency called the “possible existence” of “activities related to the development of a nuclear payload for a missile.”
(...) The inspectors reported that Iran had expanded work at its sprawling Natanz site in the desert, where it is raising the level of uranium enrichment up to 20 percent — the level needed for the Tehran Research Reactor, which produces medical isotopes for cancer patients. But it is unclear why Iran is making that investment if it plans to obtain the fuel for the reactor from abroad, as it would under its new agreement with Turkey and Brazil.

In addition the inspectors say sensitive equipment that could be used to extract plutonium for an atomic bomb has gone missing from a Tehran laboratory months after the apparatus was disclosed to a United Nations watchdog agency, LA Times reports:

IAEA inspectors were told in January by a scientist or official at Tehran's Jabr Ibn Hayan Multipurpose Research Laboratory that Iran was conducting pyro-processing experiments, work potentially consistent with creating warheads that could be used in developing a nuclear weapon.

But during an April 14 inspection of the laboratory, the equipment — used to remove impurities from uranium metal — had been removed, said the agency's report to its board of governors ahead of a meeting next week. Iran had earlier backtracked, insisting to inspectors it was not engaged in pyro-processing work.

Arms control experts say the apparent attempt to experiment with pyro-processing adds to the cloud of suspicion that hangs over Iran's nuclear program.