Iran will cold test its redesigned Arak nuclear reactor as prelude to fully commissioning it later in the year, Iran's Atomic Energy Organization said on Friday.

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Spokesman Behrouz Kamalvandi was quoted by local media as saying the cold testing, which usually include the initial startup of fluid systems and support systems, will take place early in the Iranian new year that begins this Sunday.

"In other words, we have advanced work in the field of fuel, storage, etc," Kamalvandi said.

Iran has recently accelerated its breaches of the 2015 international nuclear deal in an apparent bid to pressure US President Joe Biden to reverse his predecessor's abandonment of the agreement. Both sides are locked in a standoff over who should move first to save the deal.

Iran agreed to shut down the reactor at Arak – about 250 km (155 miles) southwest of Tehran - under the 2015 deal. It was allowed to produce a limited amount of heavy water and Tehran has been working on redesigning the reactor. It says it plans to make isotopes for medical and agricultural use.

The International Atomic Energy Agency said in a report to member states earlier this week that Iran has started enriching uranium at its underground Natanz plant with a second type of advanced centrifuge, the IR-4, in a further breach of the deal.

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.

Iran is enriching up to 20% purity at another plant, Fordo.

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Starting up the Arak heavy water reactor's secondary circuit doesn't violate Iran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers. But it does inch Tehran's program closer toward weapons-grade levels.

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Ali Akbar Salehi explained to state TV that the secondary circuit transfers heat to the reactor's cooling system. He said the entire reactor system will go online in 2021.

Heavy water helps cool reactors, producing plutonium as a byproduct that can potentially be used in nuclear weapons. Iran insists its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.

Britain is helping Iran redesign the Arak reactor to limit the amount of plutonium it produces. London has filled the role left after the US unilaterally withdrew from the nuclear deal last year.

Tehran has slowly stepped up violations of the nuclear deal to pressure world powers to provide more incentives to make up for the US withdrawal from the deal. American economic sanctions are having a crushing effect on Iran's economy.

On Sunday, Adm. Ali Shamkhani of Iran's Supreme National Security Council warned that his country will take another step in "lowering its commitment to the deal, if Europe does not implement its commitments."

The International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN's nuclear watchdog, said last month that Iran breached another limit of the nuclear deal by stockpiling more heavy water than the accord allowed.

Also in November, Washington renewed sanctions waivers that allow Russia and other European nations to conduct civilian nuclear cooperation with Iran, specifically the redesign work to continue at the Arak reactor and at the Fordow uranium enrichment facility. Both sites are monitored by the IAEA.

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