Russia's atomic energy minister said on Wednesday that Moscow had signed all agreements necessary for it to import radioactive fuel waste from an Iranian nuclear power plant that Russia is constructing in Bushehr.
Alexander Rumyuantsev's comments came in response to a report from the environmental group Greenpeace that claimed that Tehran had refused to return the spent fuel to Russia.
The low-grade spent reactor fuel could in theory be upgraded to make atomic bombs in addition to so-called "dirty bombs" of lower radioactivity, according to AFP.
"We will return all the spent nuclear fuel, and it will not fall into anybody's hands but Russia's," Rumyantsev told the Russian army's official Krasnaya Zvezda daily."Now, we are completely legitimate," he made clear.
Bushehr, whose construction is due to earn Russia some 800 million dollars, is expected to come into operation in the first half of 2004. (Albawaba.com)
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