The Times of Israel 6/19/2025
The IDF warns residents of the cities of Arak and Khondab in central Iran to evacuate for their safety. A heavy-water reactor is on the outskirts of Khondab.
The IDF says in a Farsi-language statement that the IDF is operating in the area against Iranian military infrastructure.
Heavy water helps cool nuclear reactors, but it produces plutonium as a byproduct that can potentially be used in nuclear weapons. That would provide Iran another path to the bomb beyond enriched uranium, should it choose to pursue the weapon.
Iran had agreed under its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers to redesign the facility to relieve proliferation concerns.
In 2019, Iran started up the heavy water reactor’s secondary circuit, which at the time did not violate the 2015 nuclear deal.
The UK at the time was helping Iran redesign the Arak reactor to limit the amount of plutonium it produces, stepping in for the US, which had withdrawn from the project after then-president Donald Trump’s decision in 2018 to unilaterally withdraw the US from the nuclear deal.
More:
https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/idf-warns-residents-of-2-iranian-cities-to-evacuate/
