 "Where are Iran’s nuclear sites that are under threat from Israel?")
Israel has vowed to make Iran ‘pay’ after Tuesday’s Iranian ballistic missile strikes. This has fuelled fears of a wider conflagration in the volatile West Asia.
Speculations are rife that Israel could target Iran’s oil fields or nuclear facilities. Its close ally, the United States, has called on Tel Aviv not to strike Iran’s nuclear sites. However, a top US State Department official has told CNN that Israel has not assured it would heed the advice.
Earlier this week, US President Joe Biden had said he would not support an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear programme. “If I were in their shoes, I’d be thinking about other alternatives than striking oil fields,” he said on Friday (October 4).
There is also buzz about Israel attacking Iran on the one year anniversary of Hamas’ assault on October 7.
Amid fears of Israel targeting Iran’s nuclear sites, where are these facilities? Let’s take a closer look.
Is Iran close to having nuclear weapons?
Iran’s nuclear facilities are spread over a number of places, with some even built in underground bunkers.
Israel views the Iranian nuclear programme as an existential threat. The concerns over Israeli airstrikes on Iran’s nuclear sites have loomed for decades.
The United States and the United Nations nuclear watchdog believe Iran had a coordinated, secret nuclear weapons programme that it halted in 2003. The Islamic Republic denies ever having had one or planning to have one.
Iran agreed to restrictions on its nuclear activities in exchange for relief from international sanctions under a 2015 deal with world powers. That pact fell apart after then-President Donald Trump pulled out the United States in 2018 and Iran started abandoning the restrictions the next year.
Since then, the Islamic Republic has expanded its uranium enrichment programme.
Iran, which maintains it is not seeking nuclear weapons, “now has a supply of highly enriched uranium that could be converted to weapons-grade fuel for at least three bombs in a time frame ranging from a few days to a few weeks,” according to The Washington Post report.
Iran is capable of building a crude nuclear device in six months, while it is likely to take two years or more to develop a nuclear warhead deliverable by a missile, the American newspaper report added.
Iran is now enriching uranium to up to 60 per cent fissile purity, close to 90 per cent of weapons grade, at two sites, and in theory, it has enough material enriched to that level, if enriched further, for almost four bombs, according to a yardstick of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN watchdog.
Iran’s nuclear sites
Iran has several nuclear facilities. Here’s a look at them.
Natanz
Natanz is Iran’s main site for uranium enrichment. Located about 300 kilometres south of Tehran in the Isfahan province, it houses two enrichment plants: the vast, underground Fuel Enrichment Plant (FEP) and the above-ground Pilot Fuel Enrichment Plant (PFEP).
An exiled Iranian opposition group revealed in 2002 that Iran was secretly building Natanz, igniting a diplomatic standoff between the West and Iran over its nuclear intentions that continues today.
According to DW, it is here that Iran’s nuclear programme houses centrifuges to enrich uranium for civilian and possibly military purposes.
It is built in underground bunkers and there has long been debate about how much damage Israeli airstrikes could do to it.
Natanz has been targeted several times, with Iran blaming its regional foe Israel for the attacks.
US officials told New York Times (NYT) that Israel could focus its retaliatory attack on uranium enrichment facilities in Natanz.
Fordow
On the opposite side of Qom, Fordow is an enrichment site dug into a mountain and therefore probably better protected from potential bombardment than the FEP.
The 2015 deal with major powers did not allow Iran to enrich at Fordow at all. It now has more than 1,000 centrifuges operating there, a fraction of them advanced IR-6 machines enriching to up to 60 per cent.
In addition, Iran recently doubled the number of centrifuges installed at Fordow, with all the new ones being IR-6 machines.
The United States, Britain and France announced in 2009 that Iran had been secretly building Fordow for years and had failed to inform the IAEA. US President Barack Obama said then: “The size and configuration of this facility is inconsistent with a peaceful programme.”
Isfahan
Iran has a large nuclear technology centre on the outskirts of Isfahan, its second-largest city.
It includes the Fuel Plate Fabrication Plant (FPFP) and the uranium conversion facility (UCF) that can process uranium into the uranium hexafluoride that is fed into centrifuges.
There is equipment at Isfahan to make uranium metal, a process that is particularly proliferation-sensitive since it can be used to devise the core of a nuclear bomb.
The IAEA has said there are machines for making centrifuge parts at Isfahan, describing it in 2022 as a “new location”.
After Iran’s attack on Israel in April, the latter responded by striking an airbase in Isfahan .
Khondab
Iran has a partially built heavy-water research reactor originally called Arak and now Khondab. Heavy-water reactors pose a nuclear proliferation risk because they can easily produce plutonium which, like enriched uranium, can be used to make the core of an atom bomb.
Under the 2015 deal, construction was halted, the reactor’s core was removed and filled with concrete to make it unusable. The reactor was to be redesigned “to minimise the production of plutonium and not to produce weapon-grade plutonium in normal operation”. Iran has informed the IAEA that it plans to bring the reactor online in 2026.
Tehran Research Centre
Tehran’s centre has a research reactor, a facility for the production of medical radioisotopes used in cancer treatment and nuclear medicine diagnostics, as per the DW report.
It can be potentially utilised for military purposes if highly enriched uranium is used.
Bushehr
Iran’s only operating nuclear power plant, on the Gulf coast, uses Russian fuel that Russia then takes back when it is spent, reducing the proliferation risk.
This civilian nuclear power plant is used to generate electricity and not for military applications.
Karaj
The facility is a research centre for nuclear technologies in agriculture and medicine. But it can also serve as a site for producing and developing centrifuges for uranium enrichment, DW cited reports as saying.
In 2021, Iran accused Israel of attacking a building belonging to the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran in Karaj.
Saghand
The Saghand uranium mine lies in the desert region of Yazd province. Iran said it began operations at the mine in 2013 to extract low-grade uranium ore. It would then turn into purer uranium, known as yellowcake, at nearby Ardakan.
Parchin
Parchin is home to a military base used for testing conventional weapons and missiles. However, the IAEA has previously suspected Iran of carrying out tests of explosive triggers that could be used in nuclear weapons in Parchin.
With inputs from Reuters
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