Iran Must Move if Talks with EU to Resume

Reuters:

Germany, France and Britain will resume nuclear talks with Iran only if Tehran signals it truly wants to dispel international fears about its atomic programme, Germany's new foreign minister said on Wednesday.

"A few days ago the EU3 accepted the request of Iran to resume negotiations. But the starting pistol for the resumption of talks has not been been shot yet," Frank-Walter Steinmeier told the German parliament after a visit to the United States.

He said the resumption of talks was "conditional on Iran sending signals that it will ... accept a solution that allows it to get peaceful nuclear energy but rules out the possibility that Iran will have a closed fuel cycle." READ MORE

For the so-called EU3, preventing Iran from getting a "closed fuel cycle" means that it can never be permitted to enrich uranium, a technology that would enable Tehran to make fuel for power plants or atomic weapons. Iran refuses to give up uranium enrichment, which it says is a sovereign right.

Officials from the EU3 and Iran had planned to meet next week in Vienna to discuss a Russian proposal under which Tehran would continue less-sensitive uranium conversion work in Iran but transfer the critical enrichment stage to Russia. However, EU diplomats said neither time nor venue had been set.