Iran claims ability to process Nuclear Fuel

The Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said today that Iran now has a complete cycle for the production and processing nuclear fuel. On Thursday Iran's first nuclear fuel manufacturing plant in the central Iranian city of Isfahan went online. The Isfahan plant will process enriched uranium fuel rods. The rods are then stacked in a cluster to create a fuel core for a reactor.

Ahmadinejad said that Iran is running close to 7,000 centrifuges in Iran's uranium enrichment facility in Natanz, located in central Iran. The country has also reportedly tested "two new kinds of centrifuges with capacity several times greater than the existing ones."

The United States and several other countries have concerns to the nature of the real intent of the Iranian Nuclear program.

The threat is that Iran may be secretly working to develop nuclear weapons by reprocessing the spent nuclear fuels into weapons grade nuclear material.

The UN Security Council requires that Iran suspends its uranium enrichment programs.

Iran, insists that its nuclear plan is only for peaceful purposes, vowing to continue its uranium enrichment activity despite pressure and sanctions from the UN and western countries.

Iranian officials have detained an American journalist, Roxan Saberi since January and recently charged her with espionage. A U.S. Islamic advocacy group is urging the Iranian government to release her as a gesture of good will. With the current Iranian situation the release may not diffuse the international situation but it may calm some of the current tensions.