Rouhani inaugurated the three cascades of 164 IR-6 centrifuges, 30 IR-5 and another 30 IR-6 devices at Iran's Natanz uranium enrichment plant in a ceremony broadcast by state television.
Envoys from China and Russia to the Iran nuclear talks said on Friday there had been progress in efforts to bring Iran and the United States back into compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal and that all sides would reconvene next week.
Neither the United States nor Iran expect fast breakthroughs in the talks that began in Vienna on Tuesday, with European and other diplomats acting as intermediaries because Iran rejects face-to-face talks for now.
Tehran said in February that all the crew except the captain would be allowed to leave the country as a humanitarian gesture, but most of them remained on board to maintain the ship.
Over the past 24 hours, the country officially recorded 22,586 new cases of infection, reaching a new high, health ministry spokeswoman Sima Sadat Lari said.
On Wednesday, diplomats from major powers met separately with leaders from Iran and the United States, to discuss how to bring both countries back into the fold of the nuclear deal, which was abandoned three years ago.
The United States is prepared to remove sanctions on Iran to resume compliance with the Iran nuclear deal, including those that are inconsistent with the 2015 pact.
Earlier this month, Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said his country may return to full compliance of the JCPOA if Tehran deems Washington has honoured its commitments.
The European Union will target eight Iranian militia and police commanders and three state entities with sanctions next week over a deadly crackdown in November 2019 by Iranian authorities
Iran has repeatedly rejected accusations by the West of human rights abuses.
Iran will not stop its 20% uranium enrichment before the United States lifts all sanctions, Iranian state TV quoted an unnamed official as saying on Tuesday, after a U.S. media report said Washington would offer a new proposal to jump-start talks.
Zarif repeated the Iranian position that the US needs to return to full compliance before Tehran will roll back steps it has taken that breach the deal.
The country of more than 80 million has lost more than 61,000 lives out of over 1.7 million cases of Covid-19 infection, according to health ministry figures.
President Joe Biden’s nominee to become the Pentagon’s top policy adviser faced relentless Republican criticism on Thursday over his support for the Iran nuclear deal, in a confirmation hearing that could foreshadow bigger fights over Biden’s national security agenda.
The Istanbul-Tehran-Islamabad (ITI) Freight Train will resume operations this March after nine years, according to a recent tweet by Abdul Razak Dawood.
