Now, don’t rush to judgment here. I’m sure Iran will have a good excuse (well, good enough to fool the IAEA a little longer) for the latest news about their alleged nuclear weapons program: Iran Said Interested in Nuclear Parts.

VIENNA, Austria - Iran told a black market supplier it was interested in “tens of thousands” of parts for its covert nuclear program, diplomats said Thursday, as the U.N. atomic watchdog prepared to rebuke Tehran for hindering an agency probe of its activities.

The diplomats, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said the revelation about Iran’s offer was made at a closed-door meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

An IAEA report leaked last week mentioned that Iran had acknowledged inquiring about 4,000 magnets needed for uranium enrichment equipment with a European black-market supplier and had dangled the possibility of buying a “higher number” of such markets.

At Thursday’s preparatory meeting for Monday’s IAEA board of governors’ conference an IAEA official was more precise, saying that Iran had said it was interested in “tens of thousands” of such magnets in future contracts, according to diplomats present at the closed meeting.

With two magnets per uranium enrichment centrifuge, tens of thousands of such parts would translated into a centrifuge program that significantly exceeds what Iran insists was only an experimental project.