WASHINGTON, Aug 23 (NNN-KUNA) — Reports from a senior Iranian official that the Iranian regime is starting to install centrifuges into a bunker near Qom are “troubling,” State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.

Under several UN Security Council resolutions, Iran is obligated to suspend its nuclear enrichment programme, Nuland noted during a department briefing Monday.

Iran also is supposed to be cooperating with the International Atomic Energy Agency investigation into its nuclear programme and show transparency, she said.

“The Iranian nuclear programme offers no plausible reasons for its existing enrichment of uranium up to nearly 20 per cent, nor ramping up this production, nor moving centrifuges underground,” Nuland said.

“And its failure to comply with its obligations to suspend its enrichment activities up to 3.5 per cent and nearly 20 per cent have given all of us in the international community reason to doubt its intentions,” she added.

— NNN-KUNA