Ahmadinejad: Iran expands uranium enrichment program

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Saturday that his country expanded its contentious uranium enrichment program at a plant in central Iran, a semi-official news agency reported.

"We have started installing 3,000 centrifuges," Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying by the Fars news agency.

"This is the first step toward industrial production. We will be able to produce our nuclear fuel once we install 60,000 centrifuges," he said, speaking to a group of students in the Iranian capital.

Ahmadinejad boasted last month that Iran would soon celebrate, probably in February, the completion of its nuclear fuel cycle program - from mining uranium ore to enriching it.

The hardline president also claimed that the international community was caving in to Tehran's demands to continue its nuclear program.

"Resistance of the Iranian nation in the past year forced them to retreat tens of steps over the Iran's nuclear issue," the agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying. Fars is considered to be close to Iran's hardline elite Revolutionary Guards.

Iran has been locked in a standoff with the West over its nuclear program. Israel and the US allege that Tehran is secretly trying to develop atomic weapons, but Iran contends its program is for peaceful purposes including generating electricity.