"We are getting ready to transfer fuel of Bushehr Power Plant to the pool located near the heart of reactor next week," Salehi said as quoted by the official news agency IRNA. He said the project will take seven to eight days.

The Russian Atomic Energy Corporation (Rosatom) said earlier in the day that the launch of the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant in Iran has been set for August 21.

One day earlier, Bushehr nuclear power plant workshop Chief Mahmoud Jafari said that the main tests and inspections of the power plant had been successfully carried out during the last six months.

Salehi once said on July 7 the Bushehr nuclear power plant is to become operational in the Iranian month of Shahrivar (August 23- September 22).

Russia signed a contract with Iran to complete the plant construction in 1998. The start-up date has been postponed for several times. It was originally scheduled for September 2007 but was delayed by serious financing shortage.

Russia has been helping Iran build the plant since the mid- 1990s. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin had promised Russia would start up the reactor at the Bushehr plant this summer.