United States, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany accept Iran offer of nuclear talks
Six world powers have accepted an Iranian offer for talks on its
disputed nuclear programme, the European Union's top diplomat said. The
announcement on Tuesday by EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton came after
a year's standstill that has increased fears of a slide into a new Middle East war. The statement also came
shortly after Russia called for a resumption of face-to-face dialogue as soon
as possible, saying an Iranian letter last month showed it was now ready for
serious negotiations. With Israel speaking increasingly loudly of resorting to
military action, the talks could provide some respite in a crisis which has
driven up oil prices and threatened to suck the United States into its third
major war in a decade. Iran’s nuclear negotiator, Saeed Jalili, wrote to Ashton
in February saying Tehran wanted to reopen negotiations and offering to bring unspecified
"new initiatives" to the table.” Today I have replied to Dr. Jalili's
letter of February 14," Ashton, speaking on behalf of the six powers after
weeks of consultations with them, said in a statement. "I have offered to
resume talks with Iran on the nuclear
issue."Ashton, who represents the United States, Russia, China, France,
Britain and Germany in dealings with Iran, said the date and venue for the
talks would now have to be agreed.” Our overall goal remains a comprehensive
negotiated, long-term solution which restores international confidence in the exclusively
peaceful nature of Iran's nuclear programme, while respecting Iran's right to
the peaceful use of nuclear energy," Ashton said in her reply to
Jalili.Western states are likely to tread cautiously, mindful of past
accusations that Iran's willingness to talk has been a stalling tactic to blunt
pressure and not a route to agreement. The Islamic Republic's latest approach
to the six powers comes at a time when it is suffering unprecedented economic
pain from expanding oil and financial sanctions.Talks held sporadically over
the past few years have fallen apart over Iran's refusal to address suspicions
that is covertly trying to develop atom bombs. After the last round collapsed
in January 2011, Western officials signalled there would be no more unless Iran was ready to tackle
ways to ease their concerns. The resumption of talks nonetheless could slow a
drift towards military strikes to knock out Iran's uranium enrichment
programme, which the West fears is geared to producing atomic bomb fuel and
Tehran says is for electricity only. Israel, which says its existence could be
threatened if Iran is allowed to develop nuclear weapons, is losing confidence
in Western efforts to rein in the Islamic Republic with sanctions and
diplomatic pressure. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu assured US
President Barack Obama on Monday that the Jewish state has made no decision on
attacking Iranian nuclear sites, sources close to talks in Washington said. He, however,
gave no sign of backing away from the option of military strikes.But the new
prospect of diplomacy contributed to a fall in oil prices on Tuesday, with
Brent crude down $1.70 to $122.10."The risk premium on Iran was pretty high, so
one should expect to see that fading because world powers are willing to talk
to Iran. It's much harder to launch a military strike on a country if you are
talking to them," said Olivier Jakob, analyst at Petromatrix in Zug, Switzerland. Russia, which built Iran's first nuclear power plant and has far
warmer relations with Tehran than Western nations do, has often stressed the
need for talks and said coercive pressure on Tehran is counterproductieve.Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said last month that
global powers must work harder to seek agreement with Iran, warning that
Tehran's appetite for concessions was waning as it moves closer to being able
to build atomic weapons.Ryabkov said he hoped fresh talks with Iran would
address a proposal by president-elect Vladimir Putin for global powers to
formally recognise Iran's right to enrich uranium, Tehran to submit its
programme to full IAEA supervision, and international sanctions to be
lifted.Iran said on Tuesday it would let UN nuclear inspectors visit a military
site where they have been repeatedly refused access to check intelligence
suggesting explosives tests relevant to atom bombs has been conducted there.
Diplomats, however, cited a proviso in the Iranian statement saying that access
to the Parchin site still hinged on a broader agreement on how to settle outstanding
issues which the two sides have been unable to reach for five years.An
International Atomic Energy Agency report in November said that Iran had built
a large containment chamber at Parchin, southeast of Tehran, to conduct
high-explosives experiments that are "strong indicators" of an effort
to design atomic bombs.The IAEA requested access to Parchin during talks in
Tehran in January and again in February, but the Iranian side refused.”
Considering the fact that Parchin is a military site, granting access is a
time-consuming process and cannot be permitted repeatedly," Iran's delegation to the
Vienna-based IAEA said in the statement. It added that the "process could
be ... started when the agreement on modalities is reached" - suggesting
Tehran had not relaxed its insistence that there must first be an omnibus
agreement on how to settle questions about the nature of Iran's nuclear work
before an inspection trip to Parchin could happen. Iranian diplomats and IAEA
officials were not immediately available for comment. Years of tortuous
negotiations have often come unstuck over procedural obstacles imposed by Iran since the IAEA first
began seeking unfettered access in the country almost a decade ago to check
indications of illicit military nuclear activity. Diplomats say a broad deal on
settling outstanding issues has been thwarted by Iran's refusal to let
inspectors examine sites, peruse documents and question nuclear scientists
cited in classified Western intelligence reports. Israel has mooted pre-emptive
bombings against Iran, a hawkish approach that Obama - wary of the risk of
igniting a new Middle East war and a global surge in oil prices as he seeks
re-election in November - has tried to restrain to give time for harsher
sanctions and diplomatic pressure to bear fruit.Obama and Netanyahu agreed on
Monday to maintain coordination on Iran but continued to disagree on when the
clock for non-military options should run out.Israel insists that military
action against Iran would be warranted to prevent it from attaining the
capability of making nuclear weapons, as opposed to when it actually builds a
device. Washington has not embraced that idea."The pressure (on Iran) is growing but time
is growing short," Netanyahu was quoted by aides as telling Obama.Later, addressing
the influential pro-Israel lobby AIPAC, Netanyahu said: "None of us can
afford to wait much longer. As prime minister of Israel, I will never let my
people live in the shadow of annihilation.” At the podium, he held up a copy of
a 1944 letter from the US War Department to world Jewish leaders turning down
their request to bomb the Nazi death camp of Auschwitz.Obama sought to reassure
Netanyahu that Washington was keeping its own military option open as a last
resort and "has Israel's back". He added: "We do believe there
is still a window that allows for a diplomatic resolution to this
issue."On Tuesday, US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told AIPAC:
"Military action is the last alternative when all else fails. "But
make no mistake, we will act if we have to.” Israel, believed to be the only
nuclear weapons power in the Middle East, fears Iranian nuclear facilities may
soon be buried so deep that they would be invulnerable to its bunker-busting
bombs, which are less powerful than those in the US arsenal. US officials
say that while Iran may be manoeuvring to keep its options open, there is no clear
intelligence that it has made a final decision to "break out" with a
nuclear warhead.
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