West Wary as Iran Nuclear Talks Begin

Gareth Smyth, The Financial Times:

Iranian officials will on Monday begin talks in Brussels and Moscow on their country’s nuclear programme – while their western counterparts, conscious of domestic critics ready to pounce if things go wrong, will be wary of Tehran’s talk of compromise.

When Javed Vaeedi, deputy secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC), last month called informal talks with the European Union “very positive”, the English-language Iran Daily dismissed his claim as “simply inaccurate”.

After the EU and Russia supported the International Atomic Energy Agency’s February 4 decision to report Iran to the Security Council, the newspaper argued that the fruits of Iran’s diplomacy were that “the permanent members of the Security Council plus Germany have converged on a position long advocated by the United States.”

As one of several appointments after Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad became president in August, Mr Vaeedi is part of a team that replaced one led by Hassan Rowhani, the pragmatic conservative cleric who conducted Iran’s two-year dialogue with the EU.

This new team – led by Ali Larijani, who replaced Mr Rowhani as the SNSC secretary – has taken a more assertive stance.

Iran provoked the crisis when it resumed nuclear research last month and restarted uranium enrichment activities, “for research only”, at Natanz last week. Time is running out before the IAEA reconvenes on March 6 ahead of a likely Security Council discussion.

Mr Vaeedi and Manouchehr Mottaki, Iran’s foreign minister, were due in Brussels on Sunday night for discussions with, among others, Javier Solana, the EU’s foreign policy representative.

They arrive with diplomatic wires buzzing with talk of a compromise, encouraged by reports that Mohamed ElBaradei, IAEA head, had privately suggested western diplomats recognise that limited uranium enrichment in Iran might be the only compromise possible.

It follows a statement issued by Iran’s Paris embassy on Friday that Tehran might accept the use of “modern centrifuges” – limiting uranium enrichment to a level below that required for a bomb – and in return reverse its decision to end snap IAEA inspections. READ MORE

But western diplomats involved in the talks – most for far longer than their Iranian counterparts – remain sceptical about any deal.

Meanwhile, Ali Hosseini-Tash, another SNSC deputy secretary, is due in Moscow on Monday to discuss Russia’s proposal to enrich Iran’s uranium. The idea is intended to allay concerns over diversion to weapons but runs against Iran’s insistence it must enrich at home.

While skating diplomatic minefields abroad, Iran’s nuclear team faces criticism at home both over its competence and for realigning policy towards Russia.