(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - "The installation of new centrifuges with better quality and speed is ongoing. We have announced it and the agency [UN atomic watchdog] has full supervision on them," Iranian Foreign Minister spokesperson Ramin Mehmanparast told reporters at his weekly press briefing.
"They are fully aware that Iran's peaceful nuclear activity continues to progress. This is another confirmation that Islamic republic successful stride in its nuclear activities," he added, responding to question of whether Tehran has installed the new generation of centrifuges, which enrich uranium at supersonic speed.
Despite being targeted by four sets of UN Security Council sanctions over its refusal to suspend uranium enrichment, Iran remains adamant that it will push ahead with the program.
In June, Iran's nuclear chief Fereydoun Abbasi Davani announced that the Islamic republic would expand its production of 20 percent enriched uranium and move the work from its main enrichment plant in Natanz to a smaller site at Fordo.
Iran has long been producing low or 3.5 percent enriched uranium (LEU) at Natanz, but started producing uranium at the higher level of purity of 20 percent in February 2010, ostensibly to make the fuel for a medical research reactor.
The UN Security Council in New York by the force of US has repeatedly ordered Tehran to halt all uranium enrichment until the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had verified the exclusively peaceful nature of its nuclear activities.
Iran has over 8,000 centrifuges of the first generation IR-1, with nearly 6,000 actively purifying uranium to the 3.5 percent level, according to the latest report by the IAEA, the UN nuclear watchdog, in May.
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