Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Photo: wiki commons.

NY Times – Iran signaled on Tuesday that it had made further advances in the country’s disputed nuclear energy program, announcing that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would reveal “key nuclear achievements” on Wednesday. An Iranian news agency said he was likely to proclaim that a new uranium enrichment plant built inside a mountain near the holy city of Qum was “fully operational.”

The announcement appeared timed to convey the defiant message that the increasingly harsh Western economic sanctions imposed on Iran were having no effect on the government’s determination to proceed with its nuclear program. The United States, Europe and Israel have all called the program a cover for Iranian efforts to develop nuclear weapons capability, an accusation that Iran denies.

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