(Reuters) – Iran’s nuclear negotiator said the next talks with world powers must be held without pressure, a reply to a European Union letter indicating Tehran would stick to a refusal to address its disputed uranium enrichment drive.
The United States and its allies suspect Iran is trying to develop atomic bombs under the cover of its declared civilian nuclear energy programme. Tehran says it needs nuclear power only to meet booming domestic demand for electricity.
In a letter responding to Catherine Ashton’s letter sent three months ago, Iranian chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili underlined that the next talks should be “just” and “refrain from resorting to pressure instruments.”
Analysts said such references were Iranian code meaning there could be no discussions of enrichment, which Tehran sees as its sovereign right. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said again on Monday that Iran would not give ground on enrichment.
Negotiations held in Istanbul in January failed after Tehran again rejected any notion of suspending enrichment in exchange for trade and technology benefits, as called for by several U.N. Security Council resolutions passed since 2006.
After talks with Ashton in February, Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said he hoped there would be further meetings with the “P-5+1,” the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council — the United States, Russia, China, France and Britain — plus Germany. However, no date was set.
“We welcome your (Ashton) return to the path of dialogue… Respecting nations’ rights and avoiding use of pressure are the two main pillars of cooperation,” Jalili said in the letter dated May 8, a copy of which was seen by Reuters.
Iranian state television said the letter replying to Ashton had been handed over to the EU.
BIG POWERS SCEPTICAL
But the six powers may be unwilling to rush back to talks without any prospect of agreement, especially since many Western diplomats say it is in Iran’s interests to drag out negotiations while it increases its stockpile of enriched uranium.
Moreover, Jalili’s letter reiterated Iran’s wish to discuss broader economic and security issues, which Western powers say are irrelevant to the core international concern about the nature of Iran’s enrichment programme.
He said talks should cover, for example, “the root causes of terrorism, drug trafficking, piracy in the high seas, enhanced cooperation on energy supply and security,” as well as nuclear disarmament — a reference to big powers’ atomic arsenals.
In Paris, the French Foreign Ministry called on Tehran on Tuesday to respond constructively to Ashton.
“We hope that after almost three months since Iran received (Ashton’s) letter, the Iranians will finally offer a constructive response to our proposals, go back on the preconditions for dialogue that they set in Istanbul and that they will make it possible to have real negotiations with the six (powers),” ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said.
“We are waiting for the Iranians finally to choose the path of dialogue and cooperation.”
Alluding to Jalili’s reply to Ashton, an EU source said: “At this stage, there’s basically a risk that we’re going to end up going round in circles — we’re not making much progress.”
Iran says the other countries must respect its “nuclear rights” and its enrichment activities are not negotiable.
The West is concerned about Iranian nuclear ambitions in part because Iran restricts U.N. inspections of its atomic sites and concealed sensitive enrichment-related activity in the past.
In March, the six world powers said “the door remains open” for dialogue with Iran, but made clear the Islamic Republic must engage in good-faith negotiations to find a diplomatic solution to the eight-year-long dispute over enrichment-related work.
The same month, U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Yukiya Amano said that information his office had recently received added to concerns about possible military aspects to Iran’s activities.
Iran’s stockpile of low-enriched uranium is continuously growing, officials say, despite technical problems, toughened international sanctions and the Stuxnet computer worm.
