VIENNA, 27 August 2005 — Iran plans to come up within a month with new proposals for nuclear talks with Europe and does not fear UN action against it for atomic fuel work it has resumed and vows to continue, Iran’s new chief nuclear negotiator said yesterday.
Ali Larijani, who has taken office in the new government of ultraconservative President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was speaking to reporters ahead of a UN-set Sept. 3 deadline for Iran to stop work on making atomic power reactor fuel that could also be used to make nuclear weapons.
The resumption of this work, which Iran had broken off last November to start talks with the European Union on guaranteeing its nuclear program is peaceful, has scuttled the negotiations and could lead to Iran being brought before the United Nations Security Council for possible sanctions.
Larijani said Ahmadinejad would need “about a month to elaborate a new proposal” and wanted to get other nations beyond Europe involved in the talks. Speaking after meeting in Vienna with UN atomic watchdog agency chief Mohamed El-Baradei, Larijani said Iran had not ruled out further talks with the EU as he did not feel “the European capacity to resolve this matter has already been surpassed.”
But Larijani said he felt other countries should get involved, specifically mentioning South Africa, which has proposed that Iran be able to do certain nuclear fuel work. EU negotiators Britain, France and Germany have canceled talks set for Aug. 31 in Paris, saying negotiations cannot continue unless Iran ceases all nuclear fuel work. But Larijani has challenged the role of the so-called EU-3 in leading the diplomatic initiative and called for more countries to take part.
Larijani said he had good talks with El-Baradei, whose International Atomic Energy Agency has called on Iran to reinstate the fuel work suspension and will file the report on whether Iran has done this, as well as on progress in the IAEA’s over-two-year old investigation into Iran’s nuclear program. El-Baradei’s spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said after the meeting that Larijani had “expressed his commitment to cooperating closely with the IAEA to resolve outstanding issues about its nuclear program.”
