PARIS/VIENNA: An exiled Iranian opposition group said on Thursday it had information about what it said was a center for nuclear weaponization research in Tehran that the government was moving to avoid detection ahead of negotiations with world powers.
The dissident National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) exposed Iran’s uranium enrichment facility at Natanz and a heavy water facility at Arak in 2002. But analysts say it has a mixed track record and a clear political agenda.
An accusation it made in July about a secret underground nuclear site under construction in Iran drew a cautious international response, while the United States expressed skepticism about another claim in 2010.
The NCRI’s announcement comes days before Iran and six world powers are to meet in Geneva to try to end years of deadlock over the nuclear program, with hopes of a breakthrough raised by the election of a relatively moderate president in Iran, Hassan Rowhani. Iran denies conducting any nuclear weapons work.
The Paris-based NCRI, citing information from sources inside Iran, said a nuclear weaponization research and planning center it called SPND was being moved to a large, secure site in a defense ministry complex in Tehran about 1.5 km away from its former location.
It said the center employed about 100 researchers, engineers and experts and conducted small-scale experiments with radioactive material.
“There is a link between this transfer and the date of Geneva (talks) because the regime needed to avoid the risk of visits by (UN nuclear) inspectors,” Mehdi Abrichamtchi, who compiled the NCRI report, told a news conference in Paris.
Iran ‘moving N-site to hoodwink world’
