Source: http://abcnews.go.com/International/wir ... id=2843614
By GEORGE JAHN
VIENNA, Austria Feb 3, 2007 (AP)— Technical crews have hauled centrifuges into Iran's vast underground Natanz complex and were on the threshold of launching a program that could be used to create nuclear arms, diplomats said Friday.
Hundreds of technicians have been "working feverishly" in recent weeks in the bunker-like hall beneath the desert near the central Iranian city of Natanz, said a diplomat accredited to the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear monitor.
By Thursday, they had installed and tested the pipes, wiring, control panels and air conditioning, setting the stage for hooking up the centrifuges that spin uranium into enriched levels.
Iran says it wants to develop enrichment to generate power, with Natanz as the centerpiece of a program first to link 3,000 centrifuges, and then ultimately to expand to 54,000. The United States and other countries fear Tehran will enrich to a higher level than needed for energy and use the material for the fissile core of nuclear warheads.
The recent activity in Natanz increases the tension between Tehran and the world's major powers over the Islamic republic's nuclear program, and will likely spur U.S. efforts to sharpen existing U.N. sanctions on Iran for its defiance of a Security Council demand that it freeze enrichment efforts.
"This work is not necessary for a peaceful nuclear energy program, but is needed to give Iran's leaders the know-how to make highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons," said Matt Boland, spokesman for the U.S. delegation to the IAEA.
A diplomat one of four who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the information was confidential said that with all the support equipment now installed, "everything is done except putting the machines in and hooking them up."
The centrifuges would be placed in "cascades" or series, allowing them to spin and re-spin uranium gas to a required level of enrichment low for energy, high for the fissile core of nuclear warheads.
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