Associated Press
By EDITH M. LEDERER
Associated Press Writer
Representatives from the five veto-wielding U.N. Security Council nations – the United States, Russia, China, Britain and France – as well as Germany will be holding talks as the council tries to overcome differences on a statement demanding a quick report on Iran’s nuclear program.
Senior diplomats from the four Western countries were expected to meet ahead of the six-nation meeting. Late Monday afternoon, they will be joined by the U.N. ambassadors from the six countries, U.N. diplomats said.
U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said the meeting Monday “will basically consider the longer-range issues, although obviously in the capitals in Moscow and Beijing, certainly, they will now have a look” at the latest text of the Security Council statement, and hopefully the senior diplomats will have instructions “that will allow us to make progress.”
Bolton said he would like to see agreement on the statement when the Security Council meets again on Tuesday afternoon.
Britain’s U.N. Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry also said he hoped the high-level diplomats meeting Monday would “look at the wider strategy of how we develop our relations with Iran.” He added: “But let’s be clear that negotiation of the (statement) will be done in the council.”
Two diplomats told The Associated Press in Vienna, Austria, that Britain plans to call for new talks with Iran about its suspect nuclear program at Monday’s meeting in an effort to get support from Russia and Chinese, who are allies of Tehran.
In return for the West’s willingness to resume talks with Tehran, the Russians and Chinese would be expected to agree to tougher Security Council action should that be needed, the diplomats said on condition of anonymity because the strategy was confidential.
Moscow has offered to enrich Iran’s uranium but is insisting that Iran must freeze its own uranium enrichment program – a possible pathway to nuclear arms.
Moscow and Beijing also want the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency, the International Atomic Energy Agency, to assume the main role in cajoling Iran on enrichment and its refusal to fully cooperate with an IAEA probe.
One of the diplomats said pressure might be exerted on the United States to join in. He quoted from what he said was a British proposal saying: “We are not going to bring the Russians and Chinese to accept sanctions in the following months – certainly not without further effort to bring the Iranians around.”
In return for the Russians and Chinese agreeing to tougher action should Iran remain defiant in the coming months, “we would then want to put together a package, which then could be presented to the Iranians as a new proposal,” he said, quoting from the British paper.
Neither diplomat had details on what the new incentives would look like.
But any talks with U.S. involvement likely would need to focus on economic and security guarantees meant to reassure Tehran that Washington has no plans to force a regime change. Critics of U.S. policy have maintained for years that Tehran was unlikely to compromise on its nuclear program without such a direct guarantee.
In Washington, German lawmaker Ruprecht Polenz said “we would really love it” if the United States participated in the process.
The six countries agree that Iran should not develop nuclear weapons, but they differ on the best way to get Tehran to halt uranium enrichment, which can be used either in a civilian nuclear program to generate electricity or to produce nuclear arms.
Russia and China have said tough council action could spark an Iranian withdrawal from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and eventually lead to tougher measures, such as sanctions.
The United States, Britain and France want a statement listing demands already made by the IAEA – including the suspension of uranium enrichment and steps toward greater transparency and more cooperation. They also want IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei to report to the council on Iran’s progress in meeting those demands in two weeks, which Russia and China say is much too soon.
Negotiations between Iran and France, Germany and Britain, acting on behalf of the European Union, collapsed in August after Tehran rejected an incentives package offered in return for a permanent end to uranium enrichment. Its subsequent moves to develop full-blown enrichment capabilities led the IAEA’s 35-nation board to ask for Security Council involvement earlier this year.
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Associated Press reporters George Jahn in Vienna, Austria, and Barry Schweid in Washington contributed to this report.
