The head of Iran’s nuclear program, Ali Akbar Salehi, told Iranian state television that the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization (AEOI) is about to create new types of nuclear fuel on its own.

Axar.az reports citing IRNA news agency.

“Initial steps have been taken to create modern 20 percent [enriched uranium] fuel and we are on the verge [of producing it],” Salehi said, cited by the Associated Press, noting that Iran no longer needs to rely on reverse-engineering of foreign technologies.

Salehi made clear that the steps taken by AEOI are preliminary and that the “modern fuel” Iran seeks to produce would increase the efficiency of Tehran’s 50-year-old research reactor that consumes 20-percent enriched fuel.