'Significant Construction' Reported at Israel's Infamous Nuclear Facility
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – A "Significant new construction" was reported being underway at the Israeli infamous Dimona nuclear site, which is officially known as the Negev Nuclear Research Centre.
Referring to commercial satellite imagery of the facility, the International Panel on Fissile Material (IPFM) published images on Thursday, showing construction around a massive excavation area measuring approximately 140 meters by 50 meters.
IPFM is an independent group of arms-control and non-proliferation experts from both nuclear weapon and non-nuclear weapon states.
IPFM also argued that the construction site is located "in the immediate vicinity of the buildings that house the nuclear reactor and the reprocessing plant".
The purpose of the construction remains unclear, and the Israeli government has not commented on the matter yet.
Pavel Podvig, a researcher with the program on science and global security at Princeton University in New Jersey, told The Guardian that the construction had allegedly kicked off a couple of years ago.
"It appears that the construction started quite early in 2019, or late 2018, so it's been under way for about two years, but that's all we can say at this point", the scientist claimed.
In the late 2000s, Israel reportedly used the Dimona site to create replicas of Iran's uranium enrichment centrifuges to test so-called Stuxnet malware in a bid to sabotage the uranium enrichment-related work at the Islamic Republic's Natanz nuclear facility.
Israel has repeatedly slammed Iran for developing its nuclear program, claiming the latter seeks to obtain a nuclear weapon. But rejecting the accusations, Tehran insists that the program is purely peaceful.
Israel has never denied or confirmed the widespread rumors that the Zionist state possesses a nuclear arsenal. The non-profit organization Federation of American Scientists (FAS) estimates that Tel Aviv currently has at least 90 nuclear warheads, something that makes Israel the only nuclear-armed state in the Middle East. According to FAS, the warheads were produced from plutonium obtained at the Dimona facility's heavy water reactor.
