Journalists from Europe and the United States recently toured Iranian nuclear power sites in Bushehr and Isfahan at Tehran's invitation, the British newspaper The Guardian reported Monday.

Iran did not, however, allow the journalists access to uranium enrichment facilities in Natanz or Arak, the newspaper said.

The site at Arak is where the heavy water reactor expected to produce plutonium is being built. Tehran cited technical difficulties as reasons for preventing the visit.

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According to The Guardian, an Iranian spokesman stressed to the reporters ahead of the tour that the Iranian nuclear ambitions were solely peaceful.

"You'll be able to see for yourselves the purity of our work, and you'll be able to tell the outside world the good news," the paper quoted him as saying.

The facility at Isfahan is used to prepare the uranium for further enrichment. While the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has cameras set up tracking the activities inside the facility, The Guardian correspondent reported that their supervision is lax at best.

The very existence of the facility violates a resolution by the UN Security Council, which called on Iran to suspend all uranium enrichment projects.

At Bushehr, the reporters visited the nuclear reactor, which Iran says will be used to produce electricity. The Iranians claim that 90 percent of the reactor is ready, but the reporters received the impression that it would take many more months before the reactor is operational.

According to The Guardian, it is unclear why Iran has continued to enrich uranium if the reactor is not operational. Even if they do finish setting up the reactor, it can only run on nuclear fuel that is supposed to be provided by Russia.

Russia has recently delayed its work at the reactor, and the Iranians were pessimistic about the Russian progress.

"They are playing with us," a top government official said in Tehran. "We came to the conclusion we have to be self-sufficient."