Qom (Ghom)
Iran notified the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency in a letter on 21 September 2009 "that a new pilot fuel-enrichment plant is under construction," according to Marc Vidricaire, an IAEA spokesman. According to reports, the new facility could be operational as soon as 2010. The facility is located 100 miles (160 kilometers) southwest of the capital Tehran in a mountain near the Shiite holy city of Qom.
On 25 September 2009 US President Barack Obama, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicolas Sarkozy accused Iran of building a secret nuclear facility - a charge Iran denied. Mr. Obama, made the announcement Friday at the G20 economic summit in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The leaders accused Iran's government of building a covert, underground plant to produce nuclear fuels. They insisted the International Atomic Energy Agency have access right away to ensure it is not being built to produce nuclear weapons. Mr. Obama said Western countries presented evidence of the facility to the IAEA Thursday. He said "the size and configuration of this facility is inconsistent with a peaceful program."
Prior to this disclosure, open sources were not aware of any nuclear related facility in proximity to Qom. US officials are reported to have been monitoring the facility for years. A Bush administration National Intelligence Estimate on Iran's nuclear weapons activities identified over a dozen suspect sites, though it was not immediately clear whether this site was included on that list.
Iran's international obligations include its Safeguards Agreement (INFCIRC/214), which entered into force in May 1974. The 1976 Subsidiary Arrangements to Safeguard Agreements required states to report on new facilities "normally no later than 180 days before the facility is scheduled to receive nuclear material for the first time." In February 2003, Iran agreed to a revised Code 3.1, which requires states to report on a new facility as soon as the decision to construct it is taken. In March 2007, Iran unilaterally announced that it no longer considered itself obligated by that provision of its safeguards agreement.
In a background briefing on 25 September 2009, a Senior Aministration Official stated that "it was evident to everybody, both the United States and our allies, that if the Iranians wanted to pursue a nuclear weapons option the use of the Natanz facility was a very unattractive approach; because the IAEA inspectors were there. ... So the obvious option for Iran would be to build another secret underground enrichment facility, and our intelligence services, working in very close cooperation with our allies, for the past several years have been looking for such a facility. And not surprisingly, we found one. So we have known for some time now that Iran was building a second underground enrichment facility.... it's located near the city of Qom, a very heavily protected, very heavily disguised facility. We believe that it's not yet operational. We think it's most likely at least a few months, perhaps more, from having all of the centrifuges installed and being capable of operating if the Iranians made a decision to begin operating it. Our information is that the facility is designed to hold about 3,000 centrifuge machines. Now, that's not a large enough number to make any sense from a commercial standpoint. It cannot produce a significant quantity of low-enriched uranium. But if you want to use the facility in order to produce a small amount of weapons-grade uranium, enough for a bomb or two a year, it's the right size.... it would be a terrible mistake if we prematurely disclosed the facility.... we thought it was very important to wait until the facility had reached the stage of construction where it was undeniably intended for use as a centrifuge facility."
Qom is Iran's holy city and headquarters for the Iranian clergy who run the country, though Iraq's religious centers of Najaf and Karbala provide alternative sources of theological discourse. The Shi'a religious establishments in Najaf and Qom have something of ahistorical rivalry for leadership in Shi'a theology. Qom is Iran's seveth largest city by population. Over one million people live in Qom. The Tehran-Qom-Esfahan-Shiraz highway, traverses central Iran from north to south.
Iran is populated by 89 percent Shi'a believers, only nine percent Sunni. Qom is considered a holy city because it is the site of a sacred shrine honoring a sister of the eighth Imam of the faith. In 816, Fatima, the sister of Reza the Eighth Imam, died and was buried in Qom; a shrine was erected, and the city began to develop as a major Shi'ite pilgrimage site [Mohammed's daughter Fatima is buried elsewhere]. The city is the largest center for Shi'a scholarship in the world and is much frequented by pilgrims.
For many centuries, the Hawza [seminaries] in central Iraq - at Najaf, Karbala, and Hilla - were the center of Shi'a faith. Central Iraq remained the center of Shi'a thought, even after Shi'a Islam became the state religion of Persia in 1501, at which time the Shahs of Persia assumed the mantle of the guardian of Shi'a faith, In the 20th Century, the Hawza at Qom gained prominence under the leadership of Grand Ayatollah Abd al-Karim Ha'eri Yazdi. Qom gained after the suppression of Iraqi Shi'a in the 1920's during the British Mandate period. One of Ayatollah Ha'eri's students was Khomeini, who continued to live and study in Qomafter Ha'eri's death in 1937. Sistani was born in Iran, and as a young man studied in Qom before moving to Najaf in 1952. Such movement of ideas and scholars between Najaf and Qom is not unusual.
The Assembly of Experts is based in Qom. Eighty-six Council of Guardian-approved candidates are elected by the public to eight-year terms on the assembly. The Assembly's prime responsibilities are to elect a new Supreme Leader from its membership upon the death or impeachment of the Supreme Leader, and to impeach the Supreme Leader if it determines him to be unqualified. Like the Council of Guardians, the Assembly of Experts is rarely involved in decision-making, though most members of the Assembly hold other positions in Iran's decision-making structure.
Qom is situated in a semiarid interior basin of central Iran along the Qom River, which flows down from the Zagros Mountains, through Qom, and into the large Darya-e Namak salt marsh to the city's east. Qom is bordered to the east by the western edge of the Dasht-e-Kavir (Great Salt Desert). The city depends on both ground and subterranean water sources, the latter derived from channels known as qanats.
The manufacturing of carpets in Qom began in the 20th century. The carpets are also sold under the names Ghome, Gom, Qum, Kum and Qom. Carpets from Ghom are known for their fine workmanship with pile in wool or silk. They are often manufactured with high knot density and have varied patterns, borrowed from different areas in Iran. Sometimes details are tied in silk.
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