Iran's supreme leader revealed yesterday his country's demands for a massive long-term increase in its nuclear enrichment capability, laying bare huge gaps between Tehran and world powers negotiating a deal.
The comments, published on Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's website, represent a dramatic intervention in the talks currently taking place in Vienna between Iran and the P5+1 group for a nuclear accord.
His remarks relate to the enrichment process of producing fuel from centrifuges for nuclear power stations, which the West and Israel says, in highly extended form, could be used to develop an atomic bomb.
Iran currently has around 19,000 centrifuges -- of which only 10,000 are working -- but says more powerful machines will be needed to develop enough nuclear energy in the future.
Khamenei said the required enrichment capability would be 19 times higher than the West currently wants to allow under a comprehensive agreement.
Uranium enrichment and centrifuge numbers are the most sensitive topic in the negotiations, which aim to conclude a deal by July 20. But with less than two weeks until that deadline, the supreme leader's remarks exposed a gulf that still exists between Iran and the leading nations, who are seeking to curb Iran's nuclear activities.
Referring to the machine used in uranium enrichment, Khamenei said: "Their aim is that we accept a capacity of 10,000 separative work units, which is equivalent to 10,000 centrifuges ... . Our officials say we need 190,000. Perhaps not today, but in two to five years that is the country's absolute need."
