The heavy water, stored in 600 13-gallon drums, did not appear to have been produced at Iran’s Arak heavy-water production facility, according to the Washington-based think tank. "Iran likely imported this large quantity of heavy water secretly," the group’s assessment states (Diane Barnes, Global Security Newswire, Nov. 17).

The agency’s finding "again raises questions [about] whether Iran has declared all its nuclear facilities and materials," ISIS President David Albright told the Washington Post (Warrick/Erdbrink, Washington Post, Nov. 17).

Heavy water has various civilian applications; it can also be used in the production of tritium, an ingredient used to boost the destructive power of nuclear warheads. Iran has long insisted its nuclear intentions are strictly peaceful, but the United States and other Western powers have continued to doubt those assertions.

In a Nov. 10 letter, the U.N. nuclear watchdog "asked Iran to confirm the number of drums and their contents, and to provide information on the origin of the heavy water," IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei said in his agency’s report (Barnes, Global Security Newswire).

Iran has not yet told the agency whether it is working on clandestine nuclear facilities in addition to its Qum uranium enrichment site, which Tehran disclosed in September after work on the facility was well under way, Reuters reported yesterday (see GSN, Sept. 25)

"(The IAEA wrote to Iran on Nov. 6) asking for a clear statement on whether they have similar facilities they have decided to build or are building, or have built. The IAEA has not got an explicit answer as of this morning," said one high-level international official.

The Qum facility could provide sufficient material per year for one to two nuclear weapons, but not enough for continuous operations of a nuclear power plant, according to Western diplomats and other observers.

"It goes without saying the [Qum] site will not be able to cover the needs of (a power plant). With 3,000 [enrichment centrifuges], you’d need nine to 10 installations of this size," the official added. The uranium enrichment process can produce low-enriched nuclear reactor fuel as well as highly enriched material suitable for use in weapons.

"It won’t (even) be able to produce a reactor’s worth of fuel every 90 years, but it will be able to produce one bomb a year. It does look strange," said Ivan Oelrich, acting president of the Federation of American Scientists (George Jahn, Associated Press/Yahoo!News, Nov. 16).

Iran, though, said yesterday’s U.N. nuclear watchdog report supports the nation’s contention that its nuclear program is strictly civilian in nature.

"The report shows that all the fuss made about [Qum] is totally baseless. Iran under no circumstances will abandon its peaceful nuclear facilities including enrichment work," said Iranian Ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency Ali Asghar Soltanieh (Mark Heinrich, Reuters I/Yahoo!News, Nov. 16).

Tehran intends to respond IAEA requests for information, he added: "The IAEA has the right to ask questions and our role is to answer them" (Warrick/Erdbrink, Washington Post).

Soltanieh criticized the IAEA determination that Iran’s delay in revealing the Qum facility resulted in "reduced confidence" that the nation was not working on other secret nuclear sites. Using commercial satellite imagery, the agency concluded that initial construction of the facility was carried out between 2002 and 2004 and that work on its enrichment components began in 2006 (see GSN, Oct. 13).

"We reject this 100 percent. This kind of judgment is unfair, political and beyond the (IAEA’s) mandate," the Iranian official said (Mark Heinrich, Reuters II, Nov. 17).

The U.N. nuclear watchdog’s 35-nation governing board, which is set to convene next week, might split over whether the timing of the disclosure was a violation of Iran’s safeguards commitments, according to the Post. A finding that Iran had breached its obligations could prompt diplomats to refer the matter to the U.N. Security Council for possible punitive action (Warrick/Erdbrink, Washington Post).

Soltanieh said the Qum facility was intended to preserve Iran’s uranium enrichment capability if its primary enrichment site at Natanz came under attack, Reuters reported.

"The new [Qum] site is a clear political message that neither U.N. Security Council sanctions nor the threat of military attack can stop (our) enrichment under full-scope safeguards of the IAEA," he said.

"So the advice to those (Western powers) who have so far not coped with this reality is to cope with this reality — that this enrichment will continue at any price under IAEA (monitoring) for peaceful purposes.

"This is a contingency site, complementary to Natanz, in order that our enrichment process will never, ever be suspended. Its purpose is just to have a more protected, secure site" (Heinrich, Reuters II).

Meanwhile, U.S. President Barack Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao today called for a resolution to disputes over Iran’s nuclear activities, Reuters reported.

"We agreed that the Islamic Republic of Iran must provide assurance to the international community that its nuclear program is peaceful and transparent," Obama said at a summit in Beijing.

"Iran has an opportunity to present and demonstrate its peaceful intentions but if it fails to take advantage of this opportunity it will face consequences," he said.

Hu adopted a softer tone on Iran’s disputed nuclear work.

"We both stressed that to uphold the international nuclear nonproliferation regime and to appropriately resolve the Iranian nuclear issue through dialogue and negotiations is very important to stability in the Middle East and in the Gulf region," Hu said.

China and Russia have typically opposed Western calls for tough penalties against Iran. Still, a senior Obama administration official said that Washington expected Beijing to remain united with the other world powers in dealing with the Middle Eastern state.

"I am confident that whatever direction we choose to go — we need to go — toward the end of the year, that the Chinese (will) remain part of the unified P-5 + 1 front," said Jeffrey Bader, the U.S. National Security Council’s top Asia adviser, referring to the permanent U.N. Security Council states and Germany (Bohan/Zengerle, Reuters III, Nov. 17).

Elsewhere, Tehran yesterday offered new stipulations for a proposed agreement for enriching Iranian uranium in other countries, the Tehran Times reported (see GSN, Nov. 10).

At talks in Vienna last month with the five permanent U.N. Security Council member nations and Germany, Iran tentatively agreed to terms intended to defer its ability to fuel a nuclear weapon with material produced from its low-enriched uranium stockpile. France, Russia and the United States indicated their support for a version of the proposal put forward by International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei, but Iran appeared to balk at the plan’s call for the rapid transfer of much of its uranium.

“The administration will consider national interests in the (nuclear) fuel exchange. If an agreement is reached in this regard, we will (only) deliver the 3.5 (percent enriched) fuel after we have received the 20 percent fuel,” said Parvis Davoudi, a top adviser to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (Tehran Times, Nov. 17).

Such a trade would preferably be carried out on Iranian territory, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki told The Hindu yesterday (Siddharth Varadarajan, The Hindu, Nov. 17).

Russia today said it was still too early to judge the outcome of the negotiations, AFP reported.

"I would say that it is premature to say that these efforts have not been crowned with success," Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said. "We are working for the agreements that were reached last month in Vienna … to be fully implemented, and we are aiming all of our efforts precisely at this" (Agence France-Presse II/Spacewar.com, Nov. 17).

Moscow yesterday announced a new delay in the completion of Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant, Reuters reported.

"The launch will not happen by the end of the year," said Russian Energy Minister Sergei Shmatko. "The engineers have to reach their findings. The building of the Bushehr station is defined absolutely 100 percent by technological conditions" (Katya Golubkova, Reuters IV, Nov. 16).

Lavrov today stressed that the delay was not related to disputes over Iran’s nuclear activities, ITAR-Tass reported.

"There is no link between what is happening at negotiations with Iran on the Iranian nuclear program and the issue of the Bushehr [power plant] construction," he said. "There is no politics here, the normal working process is going on, complicated, but strictly technological questions are being settled" (ITAR-Tass, Nov. 17).

One Iranian lawmaker expressed suspicion about the cause of the delay, the New York Times reported.

“If we wait another 200 years, the Russians will not complete the plant. It is naïve to believe that the Russians are cooperating with us,” state media quoted Iranian parliament member Mahmoud Ahmadi Bighash as saying (Michael Schwirtz, New York Times, Nov 17).

Another legislator said Iran could develop its own air-defense system if it did not receive S-300 defenses purchased from Russia, United Press International reported yesterday.

"Iran is not a country to come to a halt in the face of noncooperation of other countries," Iranian lawmaker Alaeddin Boroujerdi said, according to an Iranian newspaper. "Naturally, and in light of Iran’s capabilities, it will be able to produce missile defense systems in the near future."