New Iranian nuclear chief named

14 February 2011

Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmedinejad has appointed Fereydoun Abbasi-Davani as the new head of the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran (AEOI). Nuclear physicist Abbasi-Davani was the target of an alleged assassination attempt in November 2010 when terrorists on motorcycles threw a bomb at his car. Abbasani-Davani and his wife were both injured in the attack. He became a personal subject of United Nations sanctions against Iran under UN Security Council Resolution 1747 of 2007, which includes him in a list of "persons involved in nuclear or ballistic missile activities." Abbasi-Davani replaces Ali Akbar Salehi as the head of Iran's national nuclear agency after Salehi was made the country's foreign minister.

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