(JTA) — Iran has arrested several suspected foreign spies in the southern province of Bushehr, home to the country’s first nuclear power plant.

Fars News Service, the country’s semi-official news agency, reported Tuesday on the arrests but did not provide any further details.

Iranian media reported that the country’s Intelligence Minister, Seyed Mahmoud Alawi, stated that the suspects were agents for foreign intelligence services who had been engaged in surveillance and intelligence gathering, the Times of Israel reported.

Alawi stated that Bushehr province was Iran’s nuclear hub and therefore “has a special position at the national level,” according to Reuters. The Bushehr plant, the country’s first active nuclear plant, went live in 2011 and is not widely regarded as a proliferation threat as part of the country’s suspected nuclear weapons program.

Last month, the Hamshari daily reported that Iranian authorities had arrested a Ukrainian “expert” for suspected sabotage at the Bushehr power plant, according to the Times of Israel. Hamshari reported that the Ukrainian individual worked with the Russian contractor who helps run the plant.