IAEA to ramp up Iranian inspections

VIENNA, Jan. 21 (UPI) -- The IAEA said the $8.1 million needed to enforce an agreement with Iran will double the size of the inspection team used to monitor nuclear research activity.

Tero Varjoranta, deputy director-general for the International Atomic Energy Agency, said weekend inspections in Iran went well and according to the terms of a joint action plan outlined for the next six months.

"We are expecting six million euros [$8.1 million] to be needed for this joint plan of action for the next six months that has started now," he said during a Monday press conference in Vienna. "That will roughly double the size of the inspection team that we have in place as of today."

Varjoranta said he was able to confirm Iran was curbing uranium enrichment activity under the terms of a deal reached between Iran and western negotiators last year. Iran has stopped producing uranium to a level of 20 percent purity, he said.

Enriching uranium to 20 percent purity is seen as a step toward developing a nuclear weapon.

Ali Akbar Salehi, director of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, said in a separate statement Monday enrichment to 20 percent purity at the Fordo and Natanz nuclear sites was suspended on a voluntary basis, the semiofficial Fars News Agency reported.