Iran has started enriching uranium at its underground Natanz plant with a second type of advanced centrifuge, the IR-4, the UN nuclear watchdog said in a report reviewed by Reuters on Tuesday, in a further breach of Tehran's deal with major powers.
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Iran has recently accelerated its breaches of the deal's restrictions on its nuclear activities in an apparent bid to pressure US President Joe Biden as both sides are locked in a standoff over who should move first to save the deal.
Tehran's breaches began in 2019 in response to the US withdrawal from the deal and the reimposition of US economic sanctions against Iran under Biden's predecessor Donald Trump, who opposed the agreement and sought to wreck it.
Last year Iran started moving three cascades, or clusters, of different advanced models of centrifuge from an above-ground plant at Natanz to its below-ground Fuel Enrichment Plant (FEP). It is already enriching underground with IR-2m centrifuges. The deal only lets it enrich there with first-generation IR-1 machines.
"On 15 March 2021, the Agency verified that Iran began feeding the cascade of 174 IR-4 centrifuges already installed at FEP with natural UF6," the International Atomic Energy Agency said in the report to member states dated Monday, referring to uranium hexafluoride, the form in which uranium is fed into centrifuges for enrichment.
Iran has indicated that it now plans to install a second cascade of IR-4 centrifuges at the FEP but the installation of that cascade has yet to begin, the report said. Iran has already increased the number of IR-2m machines, which are far more efficient than the IR-1, installed at the underground plant.
"In summary, as of March 15, 2021, Iran was using 5,060 IR-1 centrifuges installed in 30 cascades, 522 IR-2m centrifuges installed in three cascades and 174 IR-4 centrifuges installed in one cascade, to enrich natural UF6 up to 5% U-235 at FEP," the IAEA report said, referring to the fissile purity of uranium.
Iran is enriching up to 20% purity at another plant, Fordo.
Meanwhile, France's foreign minister said on Tuesday that efforts to revive nuclear talks with Iran were being held up by "tactical problems" and the domestic situation in Iran ahead of its presidential election in June.
France, along with Britain, Germany and the European Union, are working to try to bring the United States and Iran to the table for informal talks that would be a first step to reviving the 2015 deal, which lifted international sanctions on Iran in exchange for curbs to its nuclear program.
Both sides so far appear unwilling to compromise. The Iranian New Year this week and the presidential election campaign in Iran are also likely to complicate matters.
"There is a tactical problem and also an internal (issue) in Iran, which is in a particular situation because we are quite close to the presidential election in June," Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told a hearing at the French Senate.
He did not say what the tactical problem was but added that, while there was a stated will to return to talks, tensions remained and it was urgent to move forward to calm the situation.
"We are sending signals to the Iranians so that we can have this return (to the nuclear deal), which would be the prelude to a wider discussion beyond the JCPOA (nuclear deal) on regional destabilization, but also Iran's missile capacities," Le Drian said. "The return to the JCPOA is just the starting point."
Iran has ruled out broadening nuclear talks to other subjects. Since the United States quit the deal when Donald Trump was president, Iran has progressively reduced its compliance with the pact.
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