Along a long, dusty road that heads south from this Persian Gulf port, past shops and green fields, rises an emblem of Iran’s differences with the United States: the nearly finished Bushehr nuclear power plant. For the United States, as well as Europe, Iran’s nuclear program ranks as perhaps the most important issue in the outcome of today’s presidential election. With a small army of Russian contractors welding, painting and fitting pipes inside its concrete dome and its turbine building, the $800-million plant is 84% complete and poised to receive its first nuclear fuel rods from Russia within a few months, a senior Iranian atomic official confirmed Wednesday. Officials say the plant will be in commission next year. Full Story