Iran denies exile group’s claims it has made thousands of centrifuges

AP: Iran on Saturday rejected allegations by a dissident group that the country had manufactured thousand of centrifuges capable of enriching uranium to make nuclear weapons. Earlier this week the National Council of Resistance of Iran said Tehran was working round the clock to build centrifuges and was storing thousands of the devices that already were manufactured. Associated Press

TEHRAN, Iran – Iran on Saturday rejected allegations by a dissident group that the country had manufactured thousand of centrifuges capable of enriching uranium to make nuclear weapons.

Earlier this week the National Council of Resistance of Iran said Tehran was working round the clock to build centrifuges and was storing thousands of the devices that already were manufactured.

“Hypocrites raise something to change political climate. They mislead Europeans by their wrong information,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said during his weekly briefing.

Iranian officials use the word “hypocrite” to refer to the group and its armed wing, the Mujahedin Khalq, a group that Washington and the European Union list as a terrorist organization.

Asefi said Europe has created problems for Iran by sheltering the organization and, at the same time, called it irrelevant and of little importance.

In 2002, the organization disclosed information about two hidden nuclear sites that helped uncover nearly two decades of covert Iranian atomic activity and sparked present fears that Tehran wants to build a bomb.