Failures stall Iran's nuclear ambitions

Lagging technology is hindering the country's attempts to become an atomic power.

The Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad inspects the Natanz uranium enrichment facility in 2008.

WASHINGTON // Iran's nuclear programme, which stumbled after a cyber attack last year, appears beset by poorly performing equipment, parts shortages and other woes as global sanctions exert a toll.

Western diplomats and nuclear experts said the new setbacks surfaced at a time when Iran faced growing international pressure, including allegations that Iranian officials backed a clumsy plot to kill a Saudi diplomat in Washington. Although Iran continued to stockpile enriched uranium in defiance of United Nations resolutions, two new reports portrayed a nuclear programme riddled with problems as scientists struggled to keep old equipment working.

At Iran's largest nuclear complex, near the city of Natanz, fast-spinning machines called centrifuges continued to churn out enriched uranium. But output has been declining as the equipment ages and breaks down, according to an analysis of data collected by UN nuclear officials.

Iran has vowed to replace the older machines. Yet new centrifuges recently introduced contain parts made from an inferior metal that has so far proved to be more prone to failure, according to a report by the Institute for Science and International Security, a Washington non-profit group that analyses nuclear programmes.

"Without question, they have been set back," said David Albright, the president of the institute and a former inspector for the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency. Although the problems were not fatal to Iran's nuclear ambitions, they have "hurt Iran's ability to break out quickly" into the ranks of the world's nuclear powers, Mr Albright said.

US officials have concluded Iran's leaders were seeking to acquire the technical capability to make nuclear weapons, though there were indications top officials have not yet committed to building a nuclear bomb. Iran has maintained its nuclear intentions were peaceful.

Western diplomats and nuclear experts said Iranian officials have been frustrated and angered by the programme's numerous setbacks, including deadly attacks on Iranian nuclear scientists - four have been killed by unidentified assailants since 2007 and a fifth narrowly escaped death in an attempted car-bombing. Some US officials have suggested an alleged plot to assassinate Saudi Arabia's ambassador to Washington was emblematic of the disarray within Iran's ruling elite at a time when internal strife has destabilised Tehran's closest Arab ally, Syrian president Bashar Al Assad.

They have said the plot originated from elements within Iran's elite Quds Force. But it was not clear whether the nation's top leaders knew about or approved the plan.

Mr Albright noted Iran has behaved erratically in other arenas as well, using novel tactics to try to gain advanced materials and technology for its nuclear programme and weapons systems.

"Their procurement efforts are less thought-through and they're getting caught a lot more, which suggests that they are becoming more desperate," he said.

The studies of Iran's struggling uranium programme draw on data collected by UN officials who conducted regular inspections of Iran's facilities to ensure that the nation was not diverting the enriched product into a weapons programme.

The inspectors' report documented a sharp drop in output in 2009 and 2010, providing the first confirmation of a major equipment failure linked to a computer virus dubbed Stuxnet. Western diplomats and nuclear experts said Stuxnet's designer intended to attack and disable thousands of first-generation centrifuges at Natanz, undercutting Iran's ability to make a nuclear bomb. Many experts suspected Israel created the virus, perhaps with US help, but neither nation has acknowledged any role.

Iranian scientists replaced more than 1,000 crippled machines. The plant appeared to quickly recover and production rates soared past levels seen before the attack. Yet the gains have not lasted.

Although Iran has managed to squeeze enriched uranium from the plant at a consistent rate, it needs many more centrifuges to produce the amount of enriched uranium the plant was making two years ago. The decline has been so significant that Natanz is now incapable of fulfilling the needs of the country's only nuclear power plant.

* Washington Post