Israel Matzav

Confirmed: Iran enriched uranium to 20%

The International Atomic Energy Agency has confirmed that - contrary to American claims - Iran has enriched uranium to the 20% level. Now, the feckless international regulator (whose current chairman inherited this mess from his conniving predecessor) fears that Iran will develop the capability of delivering a nuclear-armed missile.

"We do not believe they have the capability to enrich to the degree they say they are enriching," White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said at last Thursday's daily briefing.

But the IAEA report, a confidential document obtained by the Associated Press, said that Iran had hit 19.8 percent enrichment on two days last week.

"I think the conclusions of the report are consistent with what the secretary was saying in the region this week," State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said Thursday. "We have ongoing concerns about Iran's activities. We cannot explain why it refuses to come to the table and engage constructively to answer the questions that have been raised, and you have to draw some conclusions from that."

The report by the new head of the IAEA, Yukiya Amano, appears to raise greater concerns about Iran's capabilities than the assessments of his predecessor, Mohamed ElBaradei.

"Altogether, this raises concerns about the possible existence in Iran of past or current undisclosed activities related to the development of a nuclear payload for a missile," said the report, according to the AP.

What could go wrong?

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 8:45 AM