Russia plans to increase the number of specialists working at Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant to about 150 in the coming period, continuing the gradual return of its personnel to the facility after hundreds were evacuated because of security risks following the outbreak of war last February.
Rosatom returns personnel to Bushehr plant
The company’s chief executive, Alexey Likhachev, said in an earlier statement that the experts were ready to return gradually once the risks of strikes had declined. Bushehr is Iran’s only operating nuclear power plant, and Moscow is involved in operating it and supplying it with fuel and technical services. Rosatom also said in August that opportunities to expand its projects in Iran included large plants with gigawatt-scale capacity as well as smaller ones.
Russia warns against targeting nuclear facility
The Russian company kept essential personnel at the site after evacuating employees and members of their families to ensure the plant continued operating. The Kremlin warned in March of the danger of US and Israeli strikes near the facility, saying that targeting it could lead to irreversible consequences.
In April, projectiles struck an area near the plant, killing one person, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency. The agency said after the incident that no rise in radiation levels had been recorded. The Bushehr plant is used to generate electricity and is not part of Iran’s uranium-enrichment program.
Its reactor began operating and was connected to Iran’s electricity grid in 2011, after Russia completed a project that Iran had started with a German company before the 1979 Revolution. The increase in the number of Russian experts follows a 9 September vote by the IAEA Board of Governors to refer Iran to the Security Council for the first time in 20 years, amid differences between Western countries on one side and Russia and China on the other.
