Iran blames regional arch-foe Israel for Sunday’s incident at the Natanz nuclear site and will take its revenge, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Monday.
Iranian authorities described the incident a day earlier as an act of "nuclear terrorism" and said Tehran reserves the right to take action against the perpetrators.
Israel "wants to take revenge because of our progress in the way to lift sanctions ... they have publicly said that they will not allow this. But we will take our revenge from" Israel, state TV quoted Zarif as saying.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh told a news conference on Monday that the Natanz incident could be considered as an “act against humanity”, adding that it had caused “no contamination or casualties” at the site.
"Our nuclear experts are assessing the damage but I can assure you that Iran will replace damaged uranium enrichment centrifuges in Natanz with advanced ones," Khatibzadeh said.
Tehran said on Sunday that the Natanz nuclear facility had been hit by a power failure. Head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization Ali Akbar Salehi described the incident as an act of nuclear terrorism.
Multiple Israeli media outlets have quoted unnamed intelligence sources as saying that the country’s Mossad spy service carried out a successful sabotage operation at the Natanz site, potentially setting back enrichment work there by months. Israel has not formally commented on the incident.
The Natanz uranium-enrichment site, much of which is underground, is one of several Iranian facilities monitored by inspectors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the U.N. nuclear watchdog.
