Tehran  - Russia's nuclear energy chief visited Iran to inspect the progress of the joint nuclear power plant at the port city Bushehr in southern Iran, the news network Khabar reported Wednesday.

Sergei Kiriyenko, the head of Russia's federal nuclear energy agency, and his Iranian counterpart Gholam-Reza Aqazadeh went to Bushehr to get acquainted with the latest developments at the plant, Khabar said.

Iran's Atomic Energy Organization said last week that Kiriyenko and Aqazadeh would attend an initial test of the controversial plant, which has already suffered from a number of delays.

The test will be a dry run without nuclear fuel, which is under seal by the International Atomic Energy Agency, and it is expected that lead is to be used instead in the fuel rods.

Kiriyenko called the test an important step before launching the 1,000-megawatt plant later this year, intended to correct technical errors prior to the main launch.

Khabar said Russia has already delivered 87 tons of low-enriched uranium for the plant's light-water reactor and promised that nuclear fuel operations would start in 2009.

But Tehran has become sceptical of Russian promises as the joint project was originally scheduled to be completed at the beginning of the millennium, but has been delayed at least five times for various reasons.

Kiriyenko and Aqazadeh planned a press conference later Wednesday to elaborate the test results and latest developments in the plant, located 15 kilometres from Bushehr.

Despite concern in the West over Iran's nuclear programmes, the light-water project in Bushehr is tolerated due to Russia's involvement and guarantees that nuclear fuel for the plant will be delivered from and nuclear waste returned to Russia.

Iran says that its nuclear projects are just for civil purposes while the West is concerned that Iran is clandestinely pursuing a nuclear weapons programme. (dpa)