Israel has reportedly launched a major expansion of the Negev Nuclear Research Center in the southern town of Dimona, British daily The Guardian reported Thursday.
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According to the report, satellite images released by the International Fissile Material Panel, consisting of an independent panel of experts revealed new construction work at the complex.
"It appears that the construction started quite early in 2019, or late 2018, so it's been underway for about two years, but that's all we can say at this point," Pavel Podvig, a researcher with the program on science and global security at Princeton University, told The Guardian.
According to the report, the Israeli Embassy in Washington did not respond to a request for comment on the issue.
Israel has never confirmed nor denied the existence of a nuclear program.
The Jewish state's alleged nuclear program is believed to have been initiated in 1949 by the then-Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion with help from the French government.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on Saturday accused Western leaders and the International Atomic Energy Agency of hypocrisy in targeting Iran's nuclear program, while ignoring Israel's.
"Israel is expanding Dimona, the region's only nuclear bomb factory," Zarif tweeted, tagging US President Joe Biden, the IAEA, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
"Gravely concerned? Concerned? A little? Care to comment? I thought so," he wrote.
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