"Of course you might try to enrich enough uranium for a nuclear bomb with 1,600 centrifuges [as IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei said Iran had in May] but that will take time - perhaps five to 10 years. For example, to enrich enough uranium for a bomb within a year, you need a cascade of at least 10,000 centrifuges," said the expert, who asked not to be named.
ElBaradei said at a session of the International Atomic Energy Agency Monday that the inspectors who visited the Iranian enrichment facility at Natanz had witnessed what he described as "a marked slowdown" in expanding enrichment operations.
Iran has been found in contempt of three consecutive UN resolutions against its nuclear program since last year, with the six negotiator countries (UN Security Council permanent members plus Germany) demanding that Tehran suspend all enrichment prior to negotiating a solution to its controversial program, that Western powers suspect is aimed at developing nuclear weapons.
Iran has denied the accusation, saying its nuclear program would serve only electricity generation.
In an interview with The Financial Times, the new British Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary David Miliband declined to make any comment on a suggestion by a senior FT editor that "If [Iran] had 3,000 centrifuges, it could conceivably get enough nuclear material for a bomb within a year."
"While we can get into that, I don't particularly want to. I don't want to leave on the record that it's necessarily 100 per cent correct what you've said," the Foreign Secretary said.
