The day after details of the IAEA report on Iran was made public, Russia announced that it may build several nuclear power plants in Bushehr. The topic was raised by prime minister Putin at a government session. The head of Rosatom, Sergei Kirienko, said this was being looked into and shouldn't cause any concern in the international community, Gazeta.ru reports.
Russia began construction of the Bushehr plant in 1995, after which it remained unfinished for 20 years. Sanctions imposed on the Islamic Republic by the USA following the 1979 revolution, thwarting the building of the first project by Siemens Kraftwerk Union. The plant was eventually launched in August this year.
Tougher sanctions are now being threatened against the country. The IAEA report on Wednesday confirmed that Iran was working on acquiring nuclear weapons up until 2003, and there are signs of such work continuing.The building of nuclear plants in Iran would not violate international agreements, the president of The Middle East Institute Evgeniy Satanovski said, as long as Russia observed the agreements on nuclear non-proliferation, and that questions as to the rights to build more units were purely motivated by competition
Iran plans to increase its energy generation by 20 times in the next 20 years, representing $75 to $80 billion dollars, Radjab Safarov of the Centre for Contemporary Iranian Studies points out. Unconfirmed reports say that Iran may allow Russia to buils a further 5 atomic stations in Iran.
