BushehrRosatom restarted concrete and rebar work at Bushehr Unit 2.
Rosatom CEO Alexey Likhachev said a small on-site team resumed civil works, with technical and consulting support delivered remotely.
Reactor components and steam generators for Unit 2 are being manufactured on schedule, Likhachev said.
Sources: TASS
THE GERMAN ORIGIN
Bushehr Unit 1 was begun in 1975 by Siemens subsidiary Kraftwerk Union under the Shah. The 1979 revolution and Iraqi airstrikes during the 1980-88 war left the half-built containment as a concrete shell for two decades before Russia took over the contract in 1995.
THE FUEL ARRANGEMENT
Russia supplies the enriched uranium fuel for Bushehr and takes back the spent fuel — a deliberate non-proliferation structure that keeps plutonium-bearing spent rods out of Iranian hands. This is why Bushehr itself was never the proliferation worry; Natanz and Fordow, where Iran enriches its own uranium, are.
WHY ROSATOM KEEPS BUILDING
Rosatom is the world's dominant exporter of nuclear reactors — roughly two-thirds of all reactors under construction abroad are Russian VVER designs. The Bushehr contracts (Units 2 and 3 added in 2014) lock Iran into a 60-year service relationship: Russian fuel, Russian parts, Russian technicians. Sanctions on Russia complicate financing but do not stop the build.
THE GEOGRAPHY
Bushehr sits on the Persian Gulf coast, 1,200 km from Tehran and directly across the water from Kuwait, Bahrain, and Qatar. GCC states have long objected that an accident or strike on the plant would contaminate the Gulf — the same water their desalination plants draw from.
THE STRIKE TABOO
Israel has struck Iraqi (Osirak, 1981) and Syrian (al-Kibar, 2007) reactors before fuel loading. The international norm holds that once a reactor is fueled, striking it risks a radiological release that would cross borders. Bushehr Unit 1 went critical in 2011 — making it functionally untouchable. Whether that protection extends to Unit 2 during construction is exactly the question Rosatom's quiet resumption is testing.