TEHRAN – A top lawmaker said on Tuesday that the West is trying to trick Iran to relinquish its nuclear fuel.

“Although providing fuel for the Tehran reactor fuel is not that complicated…, media outlets are cunningly portraying it as highly important and complicating the issue,” Kazem Jalali, the Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Committee rapporteur, told reporters.
In spring 2008, Iran sent a letter to the International Atomic Energy Agency announcing it needs nuclear fuel for the Tehran research reactor, however, the IAEA sent the letter only to the U.S. and Russia rather than to all nuclear fuel suppliers, he said.
On the proposed exchange of uranium, he said, “The fact is that we do not completely trust the West and the plans (put forward) in negotiations because they have repeatedly proved that they do not live up to their commitments.”
Jalali referred to a voluntary suspension of nuclear activities in Iran in the past which was only intended to build trust over nuclear program but the West sought to bring Iran’s nuclear activities to a permanent halt.
The nuclear fuel talks between Iran, Russia, the United States, and France in Vienna concluded on October 21 without a final agreement, but IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei then presented a proposal for the four countries to study.
Under the draft deal, a large consignment of Iran’s enriched uranium would be shipped out of the country for processing into fuel rods with a purity of 20 percent, which would be used by a research reactor in Tehran that manufactures medical radioisotopes.
Jalali said on Monday that the proposed exchange of uranium should be done in Iran.
If Tehran is going to exchange some of its low-enriched uranium for 20 percent enriched uranium, this exchange should be done in Iran, he told the MNA
The committee chairman Alaeddin Boroujerdi also told reporters on Sunday that Iran will only exchange its low-enriched uranium after it receives the 20 percent enriched uranium promised in the latest nuclear deal.
However, he said Iran’s first priority is to buy uranium for the Tehran research reactor that produces radioisotopes.
“If we cannot buy 20 percent enriched uranium for the Tehran reactor, we can exchange it in a limited way on the provision that we receive the 20 percent enriched uranium before” delivering the 3.5 percent enriched fuel, the MP added