Iran says expanded nuclear enrichment programme

By Zahra Hosseinian and Fredrik Dahl

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran has more than 5,000 active centrifuges for enriching uranium, its president was quoted as saying on Saturday, suggesting a rapid expansion of nuclear work the West suspects is aimed at making bombs.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's announcement was likely to irritate major powers which have offered Iran economic and other incentives to persuade it to suspend enrichment activity that can have both civilian and military uses.

Western officials said after a meeting with Iran's chief nuclear negotiator in Geneva on July 19 it had two weeks to reply to an offer of a halt to new steps towards more U.N. sanctions if Iran froze the expansion of its nuclear programme.

Iran has so far ruled out a freeze to start preliminary talks or suspension of enrichment to start formal negotiations on the incentives package proposed by the six world powers -- the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany.

"Today, we have more than 5,000 active centrifuges," state television quoted Ahmadinejad as saying, adding Western capitals had backed down and now accepted this level of operation.

The U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said in May that Tehran had 3,500 centrifuges working at its Natanz facility in central Iran.

The U.N. Security Council has imposed three sets of sanctions in a stand-off that goes back to the revelation in 2002 by an exiled opposition group of the existence of a uranium enrichment facility and heavy water plant in Iran.

Iran, the world's fourth-largest crude producer, says its nuclear activities are aimed solely at generating electricity.