SEPT. 7 – Iran is steadily stockpiling enriched uranium, even in the face of toughened international sanctions, according to a U.N. inspection report that raises new concerns about the ability to monitor parts of the nation’s nuclear program that could be used to make a bomb, according to a report in the Washington Post newspaper.
FEB. 9 – “Brushing aside international calls for stricter sanctions against it, Iran said Tuesday it had begun enriching uranium for use in a medical reactor to a higher level of purity, raising the stakes again in its dispute with the United States and other countries over its nuclear program,” reports the New York Times.
FEB. 7 – “Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, ordered the nation’s atomic energy agency on Sunday to begin producing a special form of uranium that can be used to power a medical reactor in Tehran, but that could also move the country much closer to possessing fuel usable in nuclear weapons,” reports the New York Times.
JAN. 26 – “Attaining the ability to enrich uranium up to 20 percent grade brings Iran dangerously close to “break-out” point for a nuclear weapon capability,” Debkafile’s intelligence sources report.
JAN. 19 – The Associated Press reports that Iran has rejected a Western offer to swap enriched uranium for nuclear fuel. See also this report by the Canadian Press.
JAN. 14 – Reuters examines Iran’s vigorous denial of a recent Haaretz report that Iran has suspended its uranium enrichment program for two months as a gesture of “good will” toward the West.
JAN. 11 – Al Bawaba reports that Iran is refuting today’s Haaretz report that Iran has suspended its uranium enrichment program for two months as a “gesture of good will.”
JAN. 5 – Prof. Efraim Inbar, Director of Bar Ilan University’s Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies in Israel, has characterized the West’s handling of Iran and its suspected weapons program as “inept.”
JAN. 4 – Israel Radio is reporting this morning that France has rejected Iran’s ultimatum to the West that it has to accept Iran’s counterproposal to a United Nations’ brokered deal aimed at slowing the Iranian nuclear program.
The report cites the French foreign minister, Bernard Kouchner, who told RTL Radio, “We are not the ones who have to decide whether [...]
JAN. 3 – The Israeli print and broadcast media are giving prominence, this morning, to the New York Times report that Obama Administration officials feel Iran’s nuclear program has been “seriously derailed.”
JAN. 2 – It is being suggested that a New Year ultimatum issued on Iranian state television by Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, that the West has one month to accept Iran’s counter proposal for enriching its nuclear fuel stockpile, is but an effort to “push a confrontation with the West to divert public attention from political and [...]
JAN. 2 – The New York Times is reporting tonight that according to the Obama administration, domestic unrest in Iran and signs of unexpected trouble in its nuclear program are making Iran’s leaders, particularly vulnerable to strong and immediate new sanctions.”
The Times also reports that according to Obama administration officials, Iran’s bomb-development effort was “seriously derailed” by the exposure three [...]
