“Iran cuts its oil exports to six European countries,” Press TV reported.

Press TV said Iran has stopped exporting oil to Netherlands, Greece, France, Portugal, Spain and Italy.

Brent crude oil prices were up $1 a barrel to $118.35 shortly after the announcement.

The EU’s 27 member states have decided to stop importing crude from Iran from July 1 over its disputed nuclear programme, which the West says is aimed at building bombs. Iran denies this.

Iran’s oil minister said on Feb 4 that the Islamic state would certainly cut its oil exports to “some” European countries.

European Union member states would not find themselves short of oil if Iran stops exports, as they have enough in stock to meet their needs for around 120 days, a Commission spokeswoman said on Wednesday.

Iranian state television announced earlier in the day that the country was halting its crude exports to six European countries, although Iran’s oil ministry said shortly afterwards that this was not the case.

The report followed a January agreement by EU ministers to ban imports of Iranian oil in order to increase pressure over its nuclear programme. The West thinks Iran is trying to develop nuclear weapons, but Tehran denies this.

Under EU law, member states are obliged to hold stocks amounting to at least 90 days’ use so that they do not suffer shortages in an emergency.

The inventories, in a mixture of crude oil and refined products, are currently at around 120 days’ consumption, with most member states holding more than the minimum requirement, Commission spokeswoman Marlene Holzner told Reuters.

Oil rose to near $102 a barrel on Wednesday after Iran announced it would stop crude exports to six European countries and investors were heartened from positive developments in Europe’s sovereign debt crisis.

By early afternoon in Europe, benchmark crude was up $1.11 to $101.85 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract fell 17 cents to finish at $100.74 per barrel in New York on Tuesday.

In London, Brent crude was up $1.76 at $119.11 per barrel on the ICE Futures exchange.

Centrifuges

Iran has added 3,000 more centrifuges to its uranium enrichment effort, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Wednesday as he unveiled progress in his country’s controversial nuclear programme.

“Approximately 6,000 centrifuges were working, 3,000 have been added to that amount. (Now) there are 9,000,” he said in a speech broadcast on state television.

Iran said on Wednesday it has activated a new generation of centrifuges at its Natanz nuclear site that will greatly speed up its uranium enrichment activities.

“Today we witnessed the activation of the first cascade of these centrifuges,” the head of the Atomic Energy Organisation, Fereydoon Abbasi Davani, said in a speech broadcast on state television.

“They increase Iran’s capacity to enrich uranium by three times,” he said.

“This is a strong and documented response to all the sabotage conducted by the West.”

Stuxnet

Iranian engineers have succeeded in neutralizing and purging the computer virus known as Stuxnet from their country’s nuclear machinery, European and US officials and private experts have told Reuters.

The malicious code, whose precise origin and authorship remain unconfirmed, made its way as early as 2009 into equipment controlling centrifuges Iran is using to enrich uranium, dealing a significant but perhaps temporary setback to Iran’s suspected nuclear weapons work.

Many experts believe that Israel, possibly with assistance from the United States, was responsible for creating and deploying Stuxnet. But no authoritative account of who invented Stuxnet or how it got into Iran’s centrifuge control equipment has surfaced.

US and European officials, who insisted on anonymity when discussing a highly sensitive subject, said their governments’ experts agreed that the Iranians had succeeded in disabling Stuxnet and getting it out of their machinery.

The officials declined to provide any details on how their governments verified that the Iranians had ultimately defeated the virus. It was not clear when it occurred but secrecy on the subject has been so tight that news is only now emerging.

Some officials said they believe that the Iranians were helped in their efforts by Western cybersecurity experts, whose detailed technical analyses of Stuxnet’s computer code have circulated widely on the Internet.

Once the Iranians became aware that their equipment had been infected by the virus, experts said it would only have been a matter of time before they would have been able to figure out a way of shutting down the malicious code and getting it out of their systems.

“If Iran would not have gotten rid of Stuxnet by now (or even months ago), that would indicate that they were complete idiots,” said German computer security consultant Ralph Langner. Langner is regarded as the first Western expert to identify the ultra-complex worm and conclude that it was specifically targeted toward equipment controlling Iranian nuclear centrifuges.

Peter Sommer, a computer security expert based in Britain, said that once Iran had detected the presence of the worm and figured out how it worked, it shouldn’t have been too hard for them to disable it.

“Once you know that it’s there it’s not that difficult to reverse engineer... Neutralization of Stuxnet, once its operation is understood, would not be that difficult as it was precisely engineered to disrupt a specific item of machinery.

“Once Stuxnet’s signature is identified it can be eliminated from a system,” Sommer added.

Private experts say that however well-crafted the original Stuxnet was, whoever created it probably would have to be even more clever if they want to try to supplant it with new cyber-weapons directed at Iran’s nuclear program.

“Aspects of Stuxnet could be re-used, but it is important to understand that its success depended not only on ‘clever coding’ but also required a great deal of specific intelligence and testing. It was the first known highly-targeted cyber-weapon, as opposed to more usual cyber weapons which are more diffuse in their targeting,” Sommer said.

Action

Japan’s Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda Wednesday urged Israel to refrain from military action against Iran, a report said, after Jerusalem accused Tehran for a series of blasts targeting Israeli diplomats.

Tensions between the Middle East arch-foes have risen sharply following bombings in New Delhi, Tbilisi and Bangkok within a span of 24 hours, but Iran angrily rejected accusations that it was behind the “terrorist” acts.

In a meeting in Tokyo with Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak, Noda warned that military action could be “extremely dangerous” as it risks “escalating” the current situation, Japan’s Kyodo news agency reported, quoting foreign ministry officials.

Israel has blamed Iran for two bombs targeting its diplomats in India and Georgia on Monday, as well as for a series of botched explosions in Thailand on Tuesday, which Thai intelligence officials said were aimed at embassy staff in Bangkok.

Thailand on Wednesday charged two Iranians over the alleged plot, but Tehran has denied all involvement.

Noda said the bombings were “unacceptable,” while cautioning that Israel should show restraint, Kyodo reported.

Barak, who is on a five-day visit to Japan, declined to comment on whether Israel will retaliate against Iran, but urged the world to “join hands” in monitoring sanctions against Iran, Kyodo said.

In a show of solidarity, Noda said that Japan will strive to reduce its oil imports from Iran. Tokyo currently imports around 10 percent of its oil consumption from the Islamic republic, the report said.

Sanctions

Tightening sanctions aimed at pressuring Tehran to abandon its nuclear programme threaten to drive Iran’s flagship cargo shipping line out of Europe, something past efforts have failed to accomplish, a Reuters investigation shows.

Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines (IRISL), which carries an estimated one third of the country’s dry bulk and container seaborne trade, has faced European Union sanctions for its alleged role in smuggling banned weapons, including measures implemented on July 26, 2010.

Yet since then, 23 ships have visited 12 ports in the EU a total of 149 times, according to analysis including vessel movements and port calls for a Reuters special report into Iranian shipping sanctions published on Wednesday.

These include 96 visits to Malta, 14 to Antwerp, and 10 to Rotterdam. Two EU countries also still provide what critics call “flags of convenience” to the majority of the firm’s fleet.

Malta flags 48 vessels and Cyprus 12, out of a total of 144 vessels identified by the United States and the EU as IRISL vessels.

In interviews with Reuters, officials from both Malta and Cyprus indicated they will soon begin to de-register all of Iran’s sanctioned fleet and review all contracts for shipping services, effectively ousting them from Europe.

Under the EU sanctions, all IRISL assets were ordered frozen and all commercial transactions banned, but an exemption does allow some existing contracts to be honoured.

Malta’s Foreign Minister Tonio Borg confirmed in an interview that his country was “moving in the direction” of deflagging all vessels. But he insisted other countries should also act.

“We believe that all services to IRISL should be prohibited,” Borg told Reuters. “We are ready to make that sacrifice, provided that all countries also make the sacrifice.”

In Cyprus, officials suggested they would follow suit in de-registering the fleet. A Cypriot official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the Department of Merchant Shipping had already allowed international safety certificates to expire on Jan 15, making it hard for any Cypriot-registered ships to continue operations.

The Reuters investigation found that IRISL still continues to play a complex cat-and-mouse game by frequently shifting the official registered owners, flags, and even the names of vessels in an attempt to conceal their connection to the firm.

Indian Commerce Minister Anand Sharma said Wednesday that an Indian business delegation would still visit Iran despite a string of bomb attacks blamed on the increasingly isolated Islamic republic.

Sharma told AFP during a trade visit to Pakistan that terrorism and trade were “separate issues,” adding that the perpetrators behind Monday’s bomb attack on an Israeli diplomat’s car in New Delhi had yet to be established.

“I am sure that our investigating agencies will identify and bring to justice the perpetrators,” said Sharma.

Israel said Tehran was responsible for the attack which badly injured an Israeli woman, but Sharma insisted the matter had to be dealt with through the legal process.

“Let’s be very, very clear, an act of terrorism has to be dealt as per the law,” he said.

India said last week it would send a “huge” trade mission by the end of this month to Iran to explore business opportunities created by sanctions imposed by the West over the Islamic republic’s disputed nuclear programme.

Iran is India’s second-largest oil supplier after Saudi Arabia, providing around 12 percent of the fast-growing country’s crude needs.

India says it will abide only by UN sanctions, and will not implement those by individual nations or groupings.

The country has been examining ways to step up trade with Iran amid trouble in settling its oil bills from Iran as a result of the sanctions campaign that is drying up banking routes.

A leading Indian trade body said the attack may have soured the atmosphere, but that business between India and Iran is unlikely to be affected.

The Islamic republic offers huge potential for export of Indian products and commodities worth more than $10 billion annually, said The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (ASSOCHAM).

“India is a rapidly growing economy with a surging demand for commercial energy including hydrocarbons,” said secretary general D.S. Rawat.

“Iran is a close ally and important economic partner of India.”