Iran has stockpiled enough low-enriched uranium for one to two nuclear weapons, but it would not make sense for it to cross the bomb-making threshold with only this amount, a former top United Nations nuclear official was quoted as saying.
Olli Heinonen, the former chief of UN nuclear inspections worldwide, told the French Le Monde newspaper that Iran's uranium reserve still represented a "threat."
Heinonen said the Islamic Republic now possessed three tons of low-enriched uranium, material which can be used to fuel nuclear power plants, or form the core of a bomb if refined much further.
"In theory, it is enough to make one or two nuclear arms. But to reach the final step, when one only has just enough material for two weapons, does not make sense," Heinonen said in the interview just before he left office.
His department's five-year investigation based on Western intelligence funneled to the agency helped harden IAEA concerns that Iran might have worked to develop a nuclear-armed missile and was still doing so.
On the other side, Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah called on Lebanon to consider building a nuclear power plant in the energy-starved nation.
"I call on the Lebanese government to seriously consider ... building a nuclear power plant for the peaceful purpose of generating electricity, which would be more cost-efficient than the plan the government has endorsed," Nasrallah said in a speech broadcast via video link.
"Iran's Bushehr nuclear facility, which will provide a large part of Iran's electricity needs, cost much less than the (Lebanese) state's reform plan," Nasrallah said in a speech.
"We may even develop a nuclear plant that meets all of Lebanon's power needs and even sell power to Syria, Cyprus, Turkey, Jordan and other countries."
Good luck Mr. Obama, your policies are working in the region! You don’t know anything about the Middle East.