Iran said on Wednesday it could enrich uranium up to 90% purity — weapons grade — if its nuclear reactors needed it, but added it still sought the revival of a 2015 deal that would limit its atomic activities in return for a lifting of sanctions.
“Iran’s Atomic Energy Organisation can enrich uranium by 20% and 60% and if one day our reactor needs it, it can enrich uranium to 90% purity,” President Hassan Rouhani told a cabinet meeting, the semi-official Mehr news agency reported.
The nuclear deal caps the fissile purity to which Tehran can refine uranium at 3.67%, well under the 20% achieved before the agreement and far below the 90% suitable for a nuclear weapon. Iran has long denied any intention of developing nuclear weapons.
Iran has been breaching the deal in several ways after the United States withdrew from the agreement in 2018, including by producing 20% and 60% enriched uranium.
Rouhani, who will hand over the presidency to hardline cleric Ebrahim Raisi on Aug. 5, implicitly criticised Iran’s top decision makers for “not allowing” his government to revive the nuclear deal during its term in office.
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