The
explosions at Iran’s Fordow nuclear facility Jan. 21 killed at least 40
people, including two North Koreans, WND learned Sunday.
Meanwhile, the Islamic regime is labeling WND a “mouthpiece of the CIA” for its exclusive reporting of the blasts.
The bodies of 11 of the technicians and scientists are beyond
recognition, a member of the security forces at the facility told WND.
According to this source, 60 others are in critical condition and have
been transferred to the central base of the 27th Division of Mohammad
Rassool Allah, which is equipped with a modern medical facility and is
between Tehran and Qom.
At the time of the explosions, the source said, 203 Iranian
scientists and technicians along with 16 North Koreans had been logged
in at the site, though the initial report listed 240 people.
The day before the explosions, the North Koreans had brought in new
equipment, described by the source as touch-screen monitors the size of
TVs that were installed in the monitoring room and some new parts that
were installed in the centrifuges before the start of the enrichment
process.
Get the inside story in Reza Kahlili’s “A Time To Betray” and learn how the Islamic regime “bought the bomb” in “Atomic Iran.”
The explosions were reported exclusively by WND Jan. 24, with updates
Jan. 27, Jan. 29, Jan. 30 and
Jan. 31, and that the trapped workers included 16 North Koreans: 14 technicians and two military attaches.
The source said many of the centrifuges have been destroyed and
rescuers have still not accessed the reserves of the 20 percent stock of
enriched uranium to assess the level of radiation.
The International Atomic Energy Agency has not visited the site since
the explosions despite media rumors that it has, the source said.
Because the regime’s Ministry of Defense covers the project at Fordow,
officials of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization were allowed to visit it
on Jan. 5.
In an unusual move, the IAEA issued a brief statement on Jan. 29: “We
understand that Iran has denied that there has been an incident at
Fordow. This is consistent with our observations.”
IAEA spokeswoman Gill Tudor emailed that response to reporters.
However, when pushed by WND, Tudor could neither confirm nor deny the
incident had taken place and did not say whether inspectors had visited
the site after the explosions, despite some media reports that it had.
Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi, representatives of the supreme leader
and intelligence officers from both the Ministry of Intelligence and the
Revolutionary Guards have visited parts of the site that have been
cleared as secure. A counterintelligence committee has been formed to
investigate the incident, which already has been called an act of
sabotage, with Israel the prime suspect.
The regime is debating about how to explain the incident at a later
date depending on the level of destruction, the source said, but because
of internal rifts among President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, supreme leader
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the Majlis (parliament), Ahmadinejad or
others connected to his team will soon reveal the incident.
Regime media have solely based their denial that the explosions
occurred on a statement by White House spokesman Jay Carney, who told
reporters on Jan. 28: “We have no information to confirm the allegations
in the (WND) report and we do not believe the report is credible.”
However, the Islamic regime’s official news agency, IRNA,
in a report on Jan. 30, called WND a “mouthpiece of the CIA”
and its reporting mere propaganda by the West before the start of
renewed negotiations between Iran and the 5-plus-1 powers – the United
States, Britain, France, Russia and China, plus Germany.
IRNA’s report said: “WND, which publishes under the direct control of
the CIA, on Thursday, Jan. 24, reported that an explosion took place at
Fordow that destroyed much of the facility and trapped 240 personnel.
WND in its report interestingly touches on the previous sabotage at
Fordow and in a coordinated effort, the White House denies having
information and the Israelis state their happiness of such an event. The
propaganda by the West continues with the BBC reporting that Iran has
denied the report put out by Reza Kahlili, a former CIA spy in the
Revolutionary Guards.”
IRNA, in its extensive report, covered all the recent WND revelations about Iran’s nuclear program and
Russia’s involvement in it. It said that “Two days prior to the publication of the explosion report,
WND reported
that an Iranian spy in the Israeli intelligence service, Mossad, has
informed the Islamic republic that Tel Aviv and certain Western
countries have plans on covert ops for the destruction of Iranian
nuclear sites. This news agency (WND) in another report states that the
recent negotiations between the IAEA and the Iranian counterparts for
the inspection of the Parchin military site was a failure and that Iran
will resort to publication of documents from the Shah era to further
pressure the U.S.”
IRNA concluded that “the West knows this is psychological warfare
(and it) will not disrupt the goals of (Iran) in the negotiations, but
it tries to fill that void with propaganda against clear and logical
policies of the Islamic Republic, which is the result of their hatred
against the government of Iran.”
The regime media have also attacked Hamidreza Zakeri, the former
officer of Iran’s ministry of intelligence, now living in Europe, who
has provided information on the Fordow explosion and other valuable
insights into the regime’s illicit activities.
The Fordow nuclear site was central to the regime’s nuclear bomb
program, built 300 feet under the belly of a mountain where over 2,700
centrifuges were enriching uranium to the 20 percent level. That level
could within weeks be further enriched to nuclear weapons grade.
In a letter to the IAEA two days after the reported explosions,
Iran said it plans to install thousands of its upgraded centrifuges at
the Natanz facility. The source stated that this was as a direct result
of the explosions at Fordow.
Reza Kahlili is a pseudonym for a former CIA operative in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and author of the award-winning book
“A Time to Betray”
(Simon & Schuster, 2010). He serves on the Task Force on National
and Homeland Security and the advisory board of the Foundation for
Democracy in Iran (FDI).
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