TEHRAN – Ali Akbar Salehi, the vice-president and director of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI), says Iran is now fully capable of designing and constructing 45 megawatts heavy water reactors.

Salehi made the remarks in an hour-long interview with the Tehran Times in his office.

Below is the full text of the interview. It should be noted that part of the interview was published by the Tehran Times before the new Iranian calendar year.

TEHRAN TIMES: What is your current assessment of Iran’s nuclear program as a person theoretically and practically engaged in the country’s nuclear program?

SALEHI: You see on behalf of my colleagues here in the atomic agency organization, I should congratulate the great nation of Iran for having such young, intelligent, hardworking patriots who have been able to achieve great achievements in all fields of nuclear activities. By that I mean these young scientists have been able to pass the threshold of achieving all necessary requirements to get us into the full fuel cycle.

In other words, one starts with exploration, mining, conversion, enrichment, fuel manufacturing, and finally waste disposal. So, our young scientists have been really able to explore all these fields and bring them to a self-reliant stage. In other domains such as the designing of research nuclear reactors, we have taken long strides. We can reproduce research reactors like the one we have in Tehran very easily which is called the pool type reactor.  We can easily manufacture its fuel, we can set up the data acquisition system, as well as design and equip the operation or the so-called control room. These are essential parts of a research reactor, which we have been able to acquire and the rest of the work is so easy. We can even offer assistance to any other country worldwide that would wish to have a research reactor similar to what we have here in Tehran.

Another achievement in this regard is our ability to construct a forty-five megawatt heavy water reactor in Arak. That’s a different type of research reactor whose design was undertaken by our young experts. The third aspect of our capability is research and development in the domain of advanced centrifuge machines. We have developed a number of advanced centrifuge machines, more than 6 generations of machines and the last one is IR8 which is 24 times more powerful than the first generation. Such is the status of our nuclear program now.

On the heavy water, we are among the very few developing countries which is able to produce its own heavy water and now we have entered the international market, selling our heavy water. We have been able to sell more than 30 tons of heavy water just recently and this has put us on par with other countries that have been traditionally producing heavy water such as Canada and probably India. So, all these activities I just enumerated are being continued and none of these activities will be stopped. Our enrichment program will continue of course at a different capacity. Our heavy water production will continue as well as our heavy water Arak research reactor will be modernized. Exploration activities will continue at a faster pace and so will be the construction of two more nuclear power plants. We have been able to sell our enrichment services. By that I mean we were able to sell about eleven tons of enriched uranium to Russia and get yellow cake in return. So, again we are one of those very few developing countries that is able to sell two strategic commodities, one enriched uranium and the other heavy water. So, in a nutshell I can say that our nuclear activities have kept their livelihood and vibrancy. Therefore, I’m very optimistic about the future of our nuclear activities.

True that because of the nuclear deal we have accepted some constraints and limitations but these limitations are not of the type that would really slow down our peaceful activities in any way because some of those constraints are the type of constraints that would have been there any way. For example, one of the constraints that we have accepted is that for a fixed period of time we will not be producing plutonium metals. We don’t have plutonium in the first place to produce its metal. So, this is the kind of constraint that we have accepted for a limited period of time. Therefore, those limitations and constraints will in no way hinder our nuclear activities. Hence, our nuclear program will keep its vibrancy and it’s going to expand even further.

On the heavy water, we are among the very few developing countries which is able to produce its own heavy water and now we have entered the international market, selling our heavy water.

Of course, it takes some time for its expansion because once we launch the construction of new power plants, in a matter of two to three years, the project will engulf all other small projects and will require so many engineers, technicians, and experts to be able to continue the project. So, things look very optimistic and the important point is that we have acquired all these achievements through our own efforts. Nobody helped us and that is the beauty of it. Therefore, I would say the current status of nuclear program is good and is going to be even better and we will be soon putting on rail all our nuclear activities. We know our goals, destination, and direction. Therefore, we will be moving in the right path to hopefully reach the right destination which we have already envisaged for ourselves.

TT: Cyber-attacks have come to be a major change in the 21st century and this doubles in importance when it comes to the country’s nuclear facilities. What measures have you taken at a software level to prevent cyber-attack on the facilities like what happened in the Stuxnet case?

SALEHI: The first outbreak of such security attack was the Stuxnet and we learnt quite a good lesson from it. We were lucky that before the attack we got the information. Therefore, we were able to limit the consequence of the damage that may have had inflicted our facilities to a great extent. Thanks to our security, ever since that outbreak we have become more watchful and vigilant. Our sites are immune from such attacks and any equipment that we acquire and buy from outside the country undergo very meticulous scrutiny as to whether the equipments have not been manipulated in any way. Now, we have developed the expertise to raise the standards of our watchfulness and to be able to abort such sabotage. Now we are on the safe side, we have no concerns and worries and we have set up huge laboratories that are continuously monitoring the situation and everything is under control and we probably owe them a thank for making us alert and watchful. Had it not been for the Stuxnet, we would not have had this much capacity built to protect our facilities.

TT: Mr. Salehi you came to the nuclear deal and you were directly involved in the nuclear talks. Can you provide some instances for the toughest as well as sweetest moments of the nuclear negotiations?

SALEHI: Well you see this was not an easy negotiation because we were not allowed to make a mistake as any mistake once committed would have created a big challenge for my country. Specifically, when we are talking about technical negotiations, one has to be very watchful. So, we felt this very heavy burden on our shoulders that we cannot make a mistake. Your first mistake is your last mistake and of course we were facing the P5+1 countries which are advanced countries in the field of nuclear technology and comparatively speaking, we are not yet at their level. But nevertheless, we did our best to be able to ensure the rights of our great people: the rights that have been inscribed in the NPT and in the statute of IAEA.

So, you see it was a difficult negotiation. When you say tough times yes it indeed was. Each time we were going to have negotiations we were very attentive not to miss a point and that certainly entails with it vigilance, and vigilance entails with it wisdom. So, it was tough. But we also enjoyed good moments. Each time that we had a breakthrough, each time that we were able to overcome stumbling blocks, that was very enjoyable. For example, the first time I attended the meetings, there were proposals from the other side that we declined, despite their insistance. So, that was our first breakthrough because we had come to a dead end.

The reason why I entered the negotiations was that my dear brother Dr. Zarif had indicated that we had reached an impasse and we didn’t know what to do. Then, I was asked by Dr. Larijani to attend and take part in the negotiations directly. So, when I attended the negotiations, I was able to remove the first stumbling block and this was a very sweet moment for us. Later on, as we moved ahead, we gathered more experience, we began to learn more and more the art of negotiation and now that the negotiation is over, I plan to sit down and write a monograph on the art of negotiation: how should one negotiate. Therefore, yes there was a mixture of bitter and sweet moments. But at the end of the day we are happy that each side is feeling to have won the game.

We feel that we won the game, because we have our own justification to feel so. Likewise, they have the same feeling. From their perspective, this is what they say, that they were able to stop Iran from diverting from peaceful nuclear activities. That is their own interpretation. But we never had and have the intention to divert to non-peaceful activities in the first place. Therefore, let them be happy with what they think they have achieved because we never had intended to follow the path of non-peaceful activities anyway. Hence, because our path is a peaceful one, therefore as long as this path is paved then we have no problem.

TT: How do you see the role of the Supreme Leader in the negotiations?

SALEHI: I think the biggest credit goes to the Supreme Leader because since the inception of this technology, the Supreme leader has always been the supporter of this technology and effectively came to assist the atomic energy organization in expediting the process of achieving its technological goals.

Another point relates to the political resolution of this issue; again it was the Supreme Leader who permitted the second track for the negotiation between Iran and the United States and had it not been for his blessings, certainly we wouldn’t have been able to achieve what we have achieved today. This is the second point.

The third point is that during the negotiations, many times the Supreme Leader came up, making a number of remarks addressing the negotiating team and the other side. Those remarks were very effective because it helped us much. I remember in one of the meetings I raised this point that I can’t go beyond this redline because this has been stated by my leader so I cannot overstep the red line that he has earmarked. This argument was very helpful.

TT: Mr. Salehi, according to the deal, Iran has been urged to be involved in the international fusion experiment. Can you shed more light on the issue?

SALEHI: Right, fusion is the major source of energy in the future. By future I mean thirty to fourty years from now. Thirty years from now if fusion really gets operational it will certainly turn out to be the main source of energy. So that is why it is so important and we have given it special attention. We have already defined a very important fusion project in the atomic energy organization. We have a number of good scientists, have good facilities set up, but need to remember that we still have a long way to go. This is a thirty to forty years of endeavor. It’s not something to achieve overnight. But I am laying the basic building blocks now so that in matter of decades this initial nucleus will enlarge to become a big scientific community who would be able to indigenously set up our first hopefully fusion power reactor. Now, there is a very big project going on in France called “ITER”. This project is an international project that comprises I think eight countries, the United States, Russia, China, France, Japan, Germany, India, and one or two other countries. We have applied to be a member of this project. This is a big international endeavor on fusion and since we have developed the basic infrastructure, we are in a position to be able to get into this international scientific and technological activity. That is to be part of the project and to be associated with it. So, we have had negotiations with them both verbally and in writing and the results have been very encouraging so far. They have been impressed with our achievements and have stated their readiness to look into our request positively.

(The interview is conducted by M.A. Saki and Ali Kushki)