TEHRAN (FNA) - Iran is testing new generations of home-made centrifuges for enriching uranium, a senior Iranian nuclear official announced.

""At present we have included the new generations of centrifuges in our (uranium) enrichment activities and these new generations (centrifuges) are passing necessary tests rapidly,"" Head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Ali Akbar Salehi said in an exclusive interview with FNA.
Salehi explained that Iran's nuclear scientists are currently testing two advanced models of home-made centrifuges named IR3 and IR4, and added, ""Hopefully we can use the new generations of centrifuges by the end of the next (Iranian) year (early 2011) and after removing all flaws and problems.""
The Iranian official said the tests are aimed at resolving the technical flaws of the new generations, but meantime underlined that Tehran ""is not in a rush to enter the industrial-scale production stage"".
""That is not a good idea to enter the production stage without passing the required technical and industrial phases,"" Salehi told FNA.
Asked about the number of centrifuges currently spinning at Iran's nuclear facilities, Salehi put it at over 6,000 centrifuges.
Meantime, a senior aide to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Sunday that Tehran has access to the technical know-how required for enriching uranium to the purity level of 20 percent.
""We have no problem in the production of nuclear fuel (for the Tehran research reactor),"" Mojtaba Hashemi Samareh said at a meeting here in Tehran dubbed as 'Iran's International Position Following Negotiations with the 5+1 group'.
Experts speculate that the new generations of Iran-made centrifuges would enable Tehran to enrich uranium over the current purity level of 5 percent.
Uranium enriched to the purity levels of up to 5 percent is used for fueling nuclear power plants while 20-percent enriched uranium is used in production of radioisotopes for medicinal use. Production of nuclear bombs needs highly-enriched (over 90 percent) uranium.