A senior adviser to the office of Iran's Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei has said Tehran will not give up its uranium enriched to 60 percent and may raise enrichment to 90 percent. That level is widely regarded as weapons-grade.
Mohammad Javad Larijani, who advises the supreme leader's office on security, made the remarks at a conference in Tehran reviewing Iran's security and deterrence doctrine. The conference has been running in recent days, Srugim reported.
"The Americans and Western governments want to swallow us, and therefore we must be a dish that is painful to swallow," Larijani said.
He said the Iranian leadership has no intention of transferring the country's 60 percent enriched uranium to the United States or to any third country, even as part of an agreement to end the war. Iran needs the material, he said, and enrichment will continue and could rise to 90 percent if necessary.
Larijani presented the higher enrichment as serving a civilian-military propulsion purpose rather than a weapons program. "They have no right to tell us to hand over our 60% enriched uranium. We still need it, and for propulsion systems we may even go up to 90%," he said.
90 percent enrichment is the minimum level required to build atomic bombs. Naval propulsion systems, such as those powering American submarines and aircraft carriers, operate at far lower enrichment levels.
