The Nuclear Swap Offer Still on The Table.

 

February 10, 2010 (Hamsayeh.Net) - Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization Director, Ali Akbar Salehi said the door to nuclear swap proposal remains open. In an interview with Iran’s English language Press TV, Salehi reiterated, ‘We have the capability to enrich uranium to any percentage we wish, but we asked the [International Atomic Energy] Agency to ask other countries that could supply the 20-percent [enriched uranium] because we did not want to go beyond five percent. But they did not respond.’

 

He explained, Tehran’s research reactor is the only one in the country that produces medical radioisotopes for about 850,000 patients and Iran was willing to halt the 20 percent enrichment program if international suppliers of that fuel come forward and supply it.  ‘It should be simultaneous, and we accept the custody of the agency in Iran. The uranium can be under the custody of the agency in Iran and it could be sealed until the time we receive the 20-percent enriched uranium from the outside,’ he added. ’So the deal is still on the table. If they come forward and supply the fuel, then we will stop the 20-percent enrichment,’ Press TV quoted Salehi as saying.

 

Meanwhile, the United States and some of its allies said today that they were willing to simply sell, as a form of export, their own manufactured medical radioisotopes to Iran so it would halt the entire nuclear enrichment program, at once. If implemented export of radioisotopes medicines would be a lucrative source of revenue for Western suppliers at the time when they are experiencing a major economic recession. A senior US official speaking on the condition of anonymity told reporters, ‘Rather than operate a reactor, this would be a more cost-effective and efficient approach.’ 

 

The West reacted harshly to Iran’s 20 enrichment processes, which began yesterday following a nuclear swap talks early this week. Western countries sought to pressure Iran into a corner to accept shipping most of its domestically produced low enriched uranium out of the country without guarantees for when it would be returned in the form of higher enriched uranium.

 

The US and some Western states have threatened Iran with severe economic sanctions, a kind of measure Washington employ against other countries, sporadically. Similar sanctions were imposed on former Yugoslavia and the Iraqi Baath regime. However, many analysts believe those sanctions against Iran would be futile at best, since it could seriously harm the very fragile Western economic recovery envisioned by the Obama administration during his last State of the Union speech.