by Israel Hayom and Reuters
Strategic Affairs Minister Yuval Steinitz says Israel is following nuclear talks between Iran and Western powers with "hope and concern," having not ruled out a "satisfactory" diplomatic resolution • Iran reportedly willing to yield to wider inspection.
EU foreign policy chief
Catherine Ashton and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif in
Geneva
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As talks between
Iranian negotiators and the West over Tehran's contentious nuclear
program entered their second day in Geneva on Wednesday, Strategic
Affairs Minister Yuval Steinitz said that Israel was following the talks
"with hope and concern."
"Hope," he said, "because we haven't ruled out
a diplomatic resolution, and if a serious, satisfactory agreement that
distances Iran from nuclear capability is formulated, we would welcome
it. It would be beneficial for both sides."
"Concern," he went on to explain, "because we
fear that Geneva 2013 will turn into Munich 1938. History once knew an
agreement that was celebrated by the entire world and then, a year
later, World War II broke out."
Speaking at a meeting of the Knesset Foreign
Affairs and Defense Committee, Steinitz remarked that "the nuclear
standoff has an obvious, logical solution: Iran can have a nuclear
reactor to supply peaceful needs like the production of electricity and
energy, like many other countries such as Canada and Mexico, while
enrichment capabilities will be disarmed."
Meanwhile Wednesday, Iran suggested it was
ready to address calls to give the United Nations atomic watchdog wider
inspection powers as part of Tehran's proposals to resolve a decade-old
nuclear dispute with the West.
The comments, made by Iranian Deputy Foreign
Minister Abbas Araqchi, appeared to be the first specific indication of
what concessions Tehran might be prepared to make in return for the
removal of sanctions hurting its oil-dependent economy.
Iran presented a three-phase plan for ending
the standoff over its nuclear program during the first day of an Oct.
15-16 meeting with six world powers in Geneva on Tuesday. The talks were
due to resume later on Wednesday.
Iran did not give details of its proposal On
Tuesday, but said it included monitoring by the International Atomic
Energy Agency, the Vienna-based U.N. nuclear body which regularly
inspects declared Iranian facilities.
Iran's official Islamic Republic News Agency
asked Araqchi about the issues of uranium enrichment and the so-called
Additional Protocol to Iran's agreement with the IAEA.
"Neither of these issues are within the first
step (of the Iranian proposal) but form part of our last steps," he
replied without going into further details, in comments reported on
Wednesday.
The Additional Protocol allows unannounced
inspections outside of declared nuclear sites and it is seen as a vital
tool at the IAEA's disposal to make sure that a country does not have
any hidden nuclear work.
The world powers have long demanded that Iran
implement the protocol. Iran says it is voluntary. The six world powers
known as the P5+1 -- the United States, France, Germany, Britain, China
and Russia -- also want Iran to scale back its uranium enrichment
program and suspend higher-level activity.
Refined uranium can be used to fuel nuclear
power plants, Iran's stated aim, but can also provide the fissile core
of a nuclear bomb if processed further, which the West fears may be
Tehran's ultimate goal.
Western diplomats have stressed repeatedly
that they want Tehran to back up its newly conciliatory language with
concrete actions.
Both sides are trying to dampen expectations
of any rapid breakthrough at the two-day meeting, the first to be held
since Iranian President Hasan Rouhani took office, promising
conciliation over confrontation in Iran's relations with the world.
On Tuesday, a spokesman for the European
Union's foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who oversees diplomacy
with Iran on behalf of the P5+1, said that "There is still an awful lot
of work to be done."
"We have had a certain amount of information
from the Iranian side and we will hope to get more detail from them
tomorrow," spokesman Michael Mann said after the first day of talks.
His statement suggested Iran had yet to
persuade Western nations it was willing to curb the nuclear work and
assure them this was purely for peaceful energy production and medical
purposes, as Tehran says. In the Tuesday session, negotiators had
started discussing the "nitty-gritty" details of Iranian suggestions,
Mann said.
Araqchi said his side had presented a proposal
capable of achieving a breakthrough. But he later added it was not
possible to tell whether progress was being made. "It's too soon to
judge," he told Reuters.
Rouhani's election in June raised hopes in the
West that Iran was finally ready to strike a deal. Tehran is anxious to
win relief from Western-led sanctions which have crippled its economy,
cut its oil export revenues 60 percent and brought about a devaluation
of its currency, the rial.
The White House warned against expecting quick
results from the talks, saying they were complex and technical and that
economic pressure on Teheran would remain.
At the heart of the dispute are the Iranian
efforts to enrich uranium to 20% fissile purity, an advance that would
bring it close to producing weapons-grade fuel.
Iran has previously spurned Western demands
that it abandon such work as an initial step in return for modest
sanctions relief, and has repeatedly called for the most painful trade
sanctions, such as in the oil sector, to be lifted.
Western diplomats have said their demands on
the 20% uranium must be addressed before progress can be made. But some
diplomats acknowledged before the Geneva talks that the offer might be
changed substantially depending on what concessions Iran offers.
Israel Hayom and Reuters
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=12641
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