In an interview with the New York Times, International Atomic Energy Agency chief ElBaradei said inspectors had found "nothing to be worried about" at the site, which is being built inside a mountain near the Shiite holy city of Qom.

"The idea was to use it as a bunker under the mountain to protect things. It's a hole in a mountain," ElBaradei told the newspaper.

A team of four IAEA inspectors flew to Iran on October 25 for a first visit of the site, a month after the revelation of its existence had triggered widespread outrage in the West, which suspects Iran is enriching uranium with an ultimate goal of using it to make atomic weapons.

Tehran strongly denies the charge.

Iran has already been enriching uranium -- in defiance of three sets of UN sanctions -- for several years at another plant in the central city of Natanz.

Enriched uranium produces fuel for civilian reactors, but in a highly extended form can also make the fissile core of an atomic bomb.

Tehran has said it decided to build the site in Qom as a fallback in case the plant in Natanz plant was bombed by, for example, Israel.

Until now, the IAEA has declined to comment on whether its inspectors found anything surprising at the site, or whether they were given full access to the site as well as access to the necessary documentation and individuals.

Details on the visit are likely to be included in the agency's next report on Iran expected in mid-November.

Last month, ElBaradei brokered a deal between Iran, France, Russia and the United States to supply much-needed uranium to a research reactor in Tehran.

But while Moscow, Paris and Washington all quickly approved the plans, Tehran has said it wants some amendments and further talks before it agrees.

Under ElBaradei's proposal, Iran will ship out most of its known low-enriched uranium -- about 1,200 kilogrammes -- to Russia for further enrichment. The material will then be turned into fuel by France.

"There's total distrust on the part of Iran," ElBaradei said.

Some reports have suggested Iran wants to ship out the uranium piecemeal, not all at once.

But that was not the issue, ElBaradei said.

"The issue is timing: whether the uranium goes out and then some time later they get the fuel, as was agreed in Geneva, or whether it only goes at the same time as the fuel is delivered."

A simultaneous exchange "would not defuse the crisis, and the whole idea is to defuse the crisis," ElBaradei said.

Compromise proposals were being explored, the IAEA continued.

One would be to send Iran's uranium "to a third country, which could be a friendly country to Iran, and it stays there. Park it in another state, then later bring in the fuel. The issue is to get it out, and so create the time and space to start building trust," ElBaradei said.

earlier related report
Iran to give UN watchdog more details on nuclear fuel plan
Tehran (AFP) Nov 6, 2009 - Iran said on Friday it is preparing to give more details on its response to international proposals for supplying nuclear fuel and expects more negotiations, even as Washington warned the time for talking is over.

Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Iran would give the additional details to the UN nuclear watchdog following the initial response it gave to the proposals from three major powers on October 29.

"We have some more details which we have to give to the International Atomic Energy Agency," state television quoted him on its website as saying.

"We have three options -- enrich the fuel ourselves, buy it directly or exchange our uranium for fuel," he said.

"They (the IAEA and the major powers) have to choose from these options. Given the need of Iran to have the fuel, my view is that they will accept another round of discussions."

Mottaki's suggestion of further talks came despite a warning from US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday that Washington's patience at Tehran's failure to give its definitive response was beginning to wear thin.

She called on Iran to accept unamended the proposals drawn up by the IAEA after talks it held with France, Russia and the United States.

"As I have said, this is a pivotal moment for Iran, and we urge Iran to accept the agreement as proposed," Clinton told reporters.

"We will not alter it, and we will not wait forever," she said.

The proposals call for Iran to ship most of its stocks of low-enriched uranium abroad for further enrichment in Russia and conversion by France into fuel for a research reactor in Tehran.

They are aimed at allaying Western concerns that Iran could otherwise divert some of the reserves and enrich them further to the much higher levels of purity required to make an atomic bomb, an ambition Tehran strongly denies.

Iran had been due to give its response to the proposed deal by October 23 but it gave only an initial reply last month, which Iranian media say requested changes to the pace at which it ships out the uranium.

In his sermon at the main weekly Muslim prayers in Tehran on Friday, hardline cleric Ahmad Khatami asked what guarantee Iran had that it would get the fuel it needs if it shipped out a full 75 percent of its stocks as proposed under the plan.

"What guarantee do we have that if we deliver our enriched uranium, we will get the fuel?" he asked.

"If they want to harm our rights, our response will be to enrich the fuel ourselves."

Khatami warned that Iran's readiness to engage in talks with the United States on its nuclear programme was not unconditional.

President Barack "Obama's recent declaration that Americans do not intervene in Iranian events is a lie because the United States and its national media do interfere," he said.

"Unless the Americans give up their oppressive behaviour, Iran will not have satanic negotiations."

Khatami was referring to the "Great Satan" tag applied to Washington by the Islamic regime for years before the opening of direct talks on the nuclear issue earlier this year.

In comments before the prayers, the head of parliament's foreign policy and national security committee, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, took a slightly more conciliatory line.

He welcomed the fact that Western powers had made nuclear fuel proposals that, by accepting Iran's past enrichment of uranium, effectively broke with repeated ultimatums from the UN Security Council to suspend the sensitive process, which were backed up with three sets of UN sanctions.

"The proposal about the exchange of uranium basically shows that they have rejected the policy of confrontation in favour of interaction with Iran," he told Iran's official IRNA news agency.

But he added: "Uranium enrichment and nuclear technology are our absolute rights which cannot be taken away.

"The Supreme National Security Council and the president will take a decision on this issue."

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