Iran to get full control of Bushehr nuke plant

MOSCOW - Iran will get full control of its Bushehr nuke plant at the end of 2012 from the Russian contractor, a Russian project manager said Tuesday.

Igor Mezenin, local operation chief of the nuclear plant's Russian contractor, told RIA Novosti news agency that the power unit at Bushehr would be handed over to Iran "in the last week of December".

Before that, Atomstroyexport, the Russian contractor, would conduct a serial of trails, Mezenin said.

The reactor of the plant's unit reached its full capacity on August 31.

Russia's state atomic agency Rosatom said in May that it was ready to help Iran build another unit at the Bushehr nuclear power plant.

Atomstroyexport, an engineering company of Rosatom, said Bushehr, the first nuclear power plant in Iran, successfully reached 90 percent of its nominal capacity in routine trials in early May.

Iran's Atomic Energy Organization chief Fereydoon Abbasi Davani said previously the country was to launch a second power unit at Bushehr next year with a capacity of 1,000 MW.

Construction of the Bushehr plant began in 1975 by several German companies. However, work halted when the United States imposed an embargo on hi-tech supplies to Iran after the 1979 revolution.

Russia signed a contract with Iran to complete the construction in 1998. The remaining construction was postponed several times due to mounting technical and financial challenges and pressure from Washington.