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Asharq Al-Awsat
Asharq Al-Awsat
World
Asharq Al-Awsat

Rouhani Says Iran Can Enrich Uranium to 90% Purity if Needed

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani attends a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on the sidelines of a session of the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council In Yerevan, Armenia October 1, 2019. (Reuters)

Iran could enrich uranium up to 90% purity if the country needed it, President Hassan Rouhani said on Wednesday, amid efforts by Tehran and six world powers to revive a 2015 nuclear deal that Washington abandoned three years ago.

"Iran's Atomic Energy Organization can enrich uranium by 20% and 60% and if one day our reactor needs it, it can enrich uranium to 90% purity," Rouhani said in a cabinet meeting, the semi-official Mehr news agency reported.

Iran’s nuclear deal caps the fissile purity to which Tehran can refine uranium at 3.67%, well under the 20% achieved before the agreement and far below the 90% suitable for a nuclear weapon.

Iran has been breaching the deal in several ways since the United States withdrew from the agreement in 2018, including by producing 20% and 60% enriched uranium.

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