<p><br /> Iranian and Russian engineers have begun loading fuel into Iran's first nuclear power plant.<br /> </p><p><br /> This is a major milestone as Tehran forges ahead with its atomic programme despite United Nations sanctions.<br /> </p><p><br /> The week-long operation will load fuel into the reactor at the Bushehr power plant in southern Iran.<br /> </p><p><br /> It ends years of foot-dragging by Russia, which signed a £640 million contract in 1995 to build the plant but delayed its completion several times.<br /> </p><p><br /> There is international suspicion that Iran is seeking an atomic bomb and not just electricity.<br /> </p><p><br /> Iran remains under intense international pressure to stop uranium enrichment, something the West says it no longer needs to do as it can acquire nuclear fuel from abroad.<br /> </p><p><br /> State television showed live pictures of the country's nuclear chief Ali Akbar Salehi and his Russian counterpart looking on at what appeared to be a fuel rod suspended from the ceiling.<br /> </p><p><br /> Iranian officials say it will take two to three months before the plant starts producing electricity once the uranium-packed fuel rods are moved into the reactor.<br /> </p><p><br /> Tehran's refusal to cease enrichment has resulted in a series of UN sanctions and tougher unilateral measures by the United States, the European Union and elsewhere.<br /> </p><p><br /> Iran insists it is not seeking a bomb and says it has a sovereign right to nuclear technology and uranium enrichment.<br /> </p>
