Reuters: Iran expects its nuclear talks with the European Union, which broke down in August, to resume after this
week’s board meeting of the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said on Wednesday.
TEHRAN (Reuters) – Iran expects its nuclear talks with the European Union, which broke down in August, to resume after this week’s board meeting of the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said on Wednesday.
“The atmosphere exists for such negotiations to be held after the Vienna meeting (of the International Atomic Energy Agency),” Mottaki told a news conference.
The IAEA board meeting is due to start on Thursday.
Diplomats told Reuters on Tuesday that talks with Iran could resume on December 6. They said discussions would focus on a proposal that Iran transfer to Russia all of its uranium enrichment activities — a process that can be used to make atomic bombs.
Mottaki said he had spoken by telephone with British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw on Tuesday night to discuss resuming the talks which collapsed in August when Iran broke U.N. seals at its Isfahan nuclear facility and began processing uranium ore.
“We discussed the outlines of such talks. Our colleagues are supposed to finalize the time for starting negotiations, the level, and the place,” he said.
But Mottaki stressed that Iran insisted it had the right as a signatory of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) to develop a full civilian nuclear energy program.
“It is natural that we are after this right within the Islamic Republic of Iran,” he said, suggesting that Iran would not accept a proposal that barred it from enriching uranium on its own territory.
