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| Iran to unveil new uranium centrifuges, state TV says | Iran to unveil new uranium centrifuges, state TV says |
| (40 minutes later) | |
| Iran is to unveil a "new generation" of faster, more efficient uranium enrichment centrifuges, state television says. | Iran is to unveil a "new generation" of faster, more efficient uranium enrichment centrifuges, state television says. |
| President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is due to make an announcement on Iran's nuclear programme later. | President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is due to make an announcement on Iran's nuclear programme later. |
| Western countries fear that Iran is working towards making its own nuclear weapons. | Western countries fear that Iran is working towards making its own nuclear weapons. |
| Tehran denies this, saying its nuclear programme is only for energy production. | Tehran denies this, saying its nuclear programme is only for energy production. |
| President Ahmadinejad said last week that his country would be announcing "great" nuclear achievements. | |
| He said that Iran would never halt its programme to enrich uranium. | |
| In January the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) confirmed that Iran had started the production of uranium enriched up to 20% at its Qom plant. | |
| Home-grown industry | |
| Iran will also load its own domestically made nuclear fuel rods into the Tehran Research Reactor for the first time, senior national security official Ali Baqeri said. | |
| A deal to provide fuel for the reactor from abroad collapsed two years ago - at which point Iran decided to make the fuel itself. | |
| One central point links these developments, says the BBC's Iran correspondent James Reynolds: Iran is determined to show that it can master nuclear technology on its own, and that international sanctions against its nuclear programme will make no difference. | |
| The US and the European Union have recently imposed new sanctions targeting Iranian oil sales as part of a drive to increase international pressure on Tehran over its nuclear programme. | |
| Talks between Iran and six world powers - the US, UK, France, Germany, Russia and China - on the nuclear programme collapsed a year ago and show little sign of resuming. |