GLOBAL POWERS have resumed difficult talks with Iran over its disputed nuclear programme as Tehran again blamed “secret foreign services” for the assassination last week of a key nuclear scientist.
Although the two-day negotiation at a conference centre in Geneva marks the first face-to-face engagement with the Iranian authorities for 14 months, there is little prospect of any immediate breakthrough.
“What we want to get out of this is a real move by Iran to re-engage in the process,” said a European diplomat, who described the talks yesterday as a “useful” first step.
EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton is representing the five permanent UN Security Council members and Germany in the talks. She met Iranian negotiator Saeed Jalili in a three-hour plenary session yesterday morning before a series of bilateral meetings.
Senior diplomats from the US, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China are also involved.
European countries and the US are concerned Tehran is developing a nuclear bomb, something they fear could ignite a wider conflict in the Middle East.
Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad insists that is not so, arguing the programme is for peaceful means and is urgently required to boost the country’s production of electric power.
The talks started seven days after two car bomb attacks in Tehran killed one nuclear scientist, Majid Shahriar, and wounded another, Fereidoun Abbasi.
As the meeting opened in Geneva, Iranian foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki said again that Tehran suspected foreign agents of involvement in these attacks.
“Those who think murders and military violence can destroy nuclear technology have made a big mistake,” he said in Athens.
Iran has already accused the US, Israeli and British agents of plotting the attacks. The US has denied involvement while Israel and Britain have declined to comment. Nevertheless, the US has warned that military action against Iran is possible if it does not stop enriching uranium, and a military intervention by Israel remains on the table.
A European diplomat, citing prolonged stalemate with Iran over the scope of its nuclear ambition, said the western powers wanted to ensure commitment to come to further meetings, most likely in the new year.
The basic aim is to instil some momentum in the push for concessions from Tehran, whose nuclear project is seen a source of regional instability.
US diplomatic cables leaked to WikiLeaks suggest many of the country’s Arab neighbours had pushed for a US attack against its nuclear programme.
Iran’s willingness to re-enter the dialogue is seen in European countries as a sign that an intensification this year of EU, US and UN sanctions against the country is bearing fruit.
Mr Ahmadinejad, however, has insisted that his nuclear programme is non-negotiable and he has sought to widen the parameters of the talks to include “international security and political and economic co-operation”. Despite his rhetoric, sources said nuclear issues were discussed during the plenary session yesterday.
On the eve of the talks, Iran declared its determination to plough on regardless of western anxiety by unveiling what it described as a significant step forward in its nuclear project.
The country’s nuclear energy chief, Ali Akbar Salehi, said it had developed means of using domestically produced uranium concentrates, known as “yellowcake”, for the first time at a key nuclear facility. His declaration suggests that Iran can curtail its dependence on yellowcake imports at a time when sanctions are perceived to be hurting Mr Ahmadinejad’s administration.
European sources described this development as being of “relatively minor” import in the light of existing anxiety about Tehran’s nuclear activities. They said, however, that the move served to underline the “legitimacy” of western concerns that Tehran wanted to build a bomb.