Head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) announced Tehran’s readiness for to exchange enriched uranium with other countries if the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) guarantees it.
"We are willing to deliver 1 ton of our 3.5-percent-enriched uranium to the IAEA in return for 100 kilograms of 20-percent-enriched uranium." Ali-Akbar Salehi told ISNA in Tehran on Tuesday.
"Of course the necessary guarantees must be provided for such exchange to take place," he said.
Tehran rebuffed the West's yearend deadline in 2009 to accept an IAEA-drafted deal calling on Iran to ship-out the bulk of its LEU in return for fuel for a research reactor that produces radioisotopes for radiomedicine.
Iran called for changes to the proposal to provide guarantees that the West would hold its end of the deal once the LEU was sent out.
The West refused to consider Iran’s demand saying Tehran should accept the proposal as it is.
Tehran later called for the exchange to take place on Iranian territory and in stages, an offer that too was refused by the western states.
Tehran says it does not trust the West as it has an infamous history of depriving Iran of its rights.
On February 11 and after announcing that Iran would produce the 20-percent enriched uranium needed for the research reactor on its own, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had produced the first batch of the 20 percent enriched uranium.
However, his government has made known that it prefers to buy the fuel from overseas and that its offer to this effect is open.
“We have lost our trust in the West…If this mistrust did not exist we would have had no problem with the fuel exchange deal,” Salehi asserted.
Talks are underway regarding the fuel swap, he said but did not provide details. Regarding the shortage of fuel for the Tehran reactor he said “In cooperation with the Ministry of Health we have laid out plans so that the reactor can produce what is needed for medicinal use.” “At the AEOI we are working in a way that fuel for the Tehran reactor never runs out,” he concluded.

Nuclear Fusion
Iran will produce electricity through nuclear fusion in two decades, the AEOI chief said.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the first exhibition of Biotechnology Achievements in Tehran on Tuesday, Salehi said “When the national nuclear fusion plan is implemented in two decades, the country will be able to produce electricity through this method,” IRNA reported.
Implementation of this project [nuclear fusion] will commence this year according to a contract signed between AEOI and the president’s Office for Scientific Affairs, he explained.
The AEOI chief continued “The national nuclear fusion project has been put on the agenda and scientists have been invited to help.” He described the project as time-intensive and said “If we layout the fundamentals of the nuclear fusion technology on a correct course, we will be able to produce electricity through it in one to two decades.”