A Worrying Step on the Road to Developing an Atomic Bomb

By Sam Marsden

Iran’s nuclear programme has increasingly come to be at the heart of international diplomacy in recent years.

Tehran’s moves yesterday to resume work at its nuclear research facilities have done nothing to allay growing fears in the West that it could develop an atomic bomb.

While delicate negotiations with the Middle Eastern nation have continued behind the scenes, Iranian officials have made increasingly provocative announcements about their nuclear ambitions.

Iran has consistently said its nuclear programme is only intended to generate electricity, but it wants to develop its own techniques for enriching uranium – also needed to make an atomic weapon.

Iran’s Nuclear Energy Council has said the country must produce 7,000 megawatts of electricity through nuclear power plants by 2021 to meet its increasing electricity demands.

But the United States questions why the Islamic state needs nuclear power when it contains 12 per cent of global recoverable oil fields and the world’s second largest gas reserves after Russia.

Washington believes Iran has a secret programme to build nuclear weapons and has been lobbying for the country to be referred to the UN Security Council, which could impose sanctions.

Under the 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which Iran has signed, countries are prohibited from making nuclear weapons but allowed to develop atomic power for peaceful purposes.

Tehran hid its nuclear activities from UN inspectors for nearly two decades before two secret sites were exposed by Iranian dissidents in 2002. In November 2004 Iran agreed to suspend its nuclear enrichment activities during talks to come to an agreement about its atomic programme with the "EU three" – Britain, France and Germany.

In May 2005 Iran’s parliament voted in support of a bill requiring the government to resume its nuclear fuel enrichment programme and in June that year hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadine-jad was elected president.

The announcement that Iran had removed seals on its nuclear research facilities therefore came as no surprise, but for the West it represents another step to developing an atomic bomb.