Iran, Russia to speed up implementation of nuclear projects: Official

AEOI and Russia's Rosatom hold periodical consultations on bilateral ties, Behrouz Kamalvandi told the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) in Moscow after talks with the Rosatom CEO Alexey Likhachev and Deputy Director General for International Relations of the company Nikolai Spasskiy.

Kamalvandi said his talks with the Russian officials focused on the construction of the second and third units of the Bushehr nuclear power plant in south of Iran.

About the construction of the second and third units of the Iranian power plant, the official said preliminary steps have been taken and the process is going through on schedule.

'We don't lag behind, but I think we are going to make shorter the time of projects implementation,' said Kamalvandi.

Referring to development of the first unit of Bushehr power plant, the official said its operation did face long delay due to the Western sanctions against the country.

However, he noted, the country could resolve the problems and manage to launch the first unit of the nuclear power plant in the Iranian southern port city.

Referring to good cooperation between Tehran and Moscow both during the Western-imposed sanctions and after the signing of the nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the nuclear official said the Russians did help a lot implementation of the international deal between Tehran and major world powers.

Exchange of Iran's enriched uranium with yellow cake was among bilateral agreements reached between the two countries based on the JCPOA, said Kamalvandi stressing Tehran has also good ties with Moscow in the area of stable isotopes.

On Iran's achievements in the nuclear fuel cycle, the AEOI spokesman said the Islamic Republic owns the know-how on development of the nuclear fuel cycle.

Iran is quite knowledgeable on the issue and is self-sufficient in some parts of the nuclear fuel cycle, but in some other parts, the country needs international cooperation.

He further appreciated Russia's approach in dealing with the JCPOA, stressing Moscow did also adopted a good reasonable stance on the issue in the July 21 meeting of the JCPOA Joint Commission held in the Austrian capital.

Russia is among the world's modern countries which are pioneers in construction of the nuclear power plants.

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