Enriched Uranium, Nuclear Weapon | featured news

In what would be a significant concession, Obama administration officials say they could support allowing Iran to maintain a crucial element of its disputed nuclear program if Tehran took other major steps to curb its ability to develop a nuclear bomb.

Saudia Arabia would move quickly to acquire nuclear weapons if Iran successfully tests an atomic bomb, according to a report. Citing an unidentified Saudi Arabian source, the Times newspaper in the U.K. (which operates behind a paywall) said that the kingdom would seek to buy ready-made warheads and also begin its own program to enrich weapons-grade uranium.

Iran would consider ending higher level uranium enrichment, the most crucial part of its controversial nuclear activities, if world powers send Tehran nuclear fuel for a medical research reactor, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told reporters Friday.

Iran would stop higher-grade enrichment if it is assured of nuclear fuel supplies for a research reactor, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying in a Japanese newspaper on Friday.

Iran has formally set out its terms for giving up most of its cache of enriched uranium in a confidential document, and the conditions fall short of what has been demanded by the United States and other world powers....

Iran began enriching uranium to a level at which it can sustain a nuclear reaction before United Nations inspectors arrived to monitor the process, and in defiance of a specific request that it not so do, the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency said Thursday.

Russia joined the U.S. and France in urging Iran to stop enriching uranium to higher levels in a statement shared Tuesday with The Associated Press, suggesting the project reinforced suspicions that Tehran is seeking to make nuclear weapons.

Ahmadinejad says first batch of higher enriched uranium produced: Iran now "a nuclear state."

Iran is experiencing surprising setbacks in its efforts to enrich uranium, according to new assessments that suggest equipment failures could undermine its nuclear ambitions.

Iran said it has begun enriching some of its low-grade uranium for use in a medical-research reactor, brushing off fresh international threats of economic sanctions.