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Iran's first atomic power plant, a symbol of what the Islamic Republic says is its peaceful nuclear ambition, is now operating at full capacity, Russia's state nuclear corporation Rosatom said on Friday.

The Russian-built 1,000-megawatt reactor near the Gulf city of Bushehr, was plugged into Iran's national grid last September, ending years of delays and suspicions that Moscow was using the project as a diplomatic lever.

Bushehr was started by Germany's Siemens before the 1979 Islamic Revolution and was taken over by Russian engineers in the 1990s.

The United States for years urged Russia to abandon the project, fearing it could help Tehran develop nuclear weapons.

Those concerns were eased by an agreement under which Russia will supply enriched uranium for the reactor and repatriate spent fuel that could be reprocessed into weapons-grade plutonium.