Stating that Iran has produced 20% enriched uranium in 12 hours, Spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) said the country can easily achieve higher enrichment rates.

Behrouz Kamalvandi made the remarks on Monday night in a televised program.

Stating that this event was in line with the implementation of the Parliament's motion on 'strategic action to lift sanctions' and Iran must increase the level of 20% uranium enrichment reserves to 120 kg by the end of the year, he said, "This storage requires a series of technical work. About four days ago, we wrote a letter to the International Atomic Energy Agency stating that we needed this level of enrichment."

"Two days ago, we wrote another letter informing the agency that we were taking such action," he added, saying, "The VIQ process began Sunday at 10 a.m. with the presence of two IAEA inspectors and ended around noon. The enrichment process began immediately afterwards."

Referring to the fourth step of reducing the JCPOA commitments, Kamalvandi said, "We increased the level of enrichment from 3.67% to 4.5% in July."

"In 2010, we produced 20% fuel and the capability is not something new. We have the ability to enrich above 20% easily and we are currently exploring it," he added.

In a brief talk with Mehr News Agency on Monday, Ali Rabiei pointed to Iran�s counteractive plan to enrich uranium to up to 20% purity, saying that the gas injection process into centrifuges started �hours ago� following President Hassan Rouhani�s recent order on the implementation of the plan.