Atomic power engineers in Iran have started redesigning a partly constructed reactor in the northwest city of Arak to limit the amount of plutonium it produces, the country’s top nuclear official said Wednesday, expressing hope that the change would help alleviate Western objections that the plutonium could be used in weapons. The official, Ali Akbar Salehi, the director of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, did not specify how much plutonium would be produced under the redesign of the reactor, which officials have said was constructed for the peaceful purpose of creating medical isotopes. But in remarks reported by Iran’s state-run Press TV website, Mr. Salehi said experts at the facility had offered to “redesign the heart of the reactor in order to allay the concerns of some countries.” Both plutonium and uranium can be used as the fuel of nuclear weapons . The Arak reactor is one of […]