01 June 2006
Foreign Ministers Agree on Incentives, Penalties for Iran
Call on Iran to suspend uranium enrichment, reprocessing activities
By David Shelby
Washington File Staff Writer
Washington -- Foreign ministers from the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and Germany said June 1 that they are prepared to resume negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program and suspend further action in the Security Council if Iran agrees to halt its uranium enrichment and reprocessing activities.
If Iran rejects negotiations under these conditions, the ministers said they would take further steps in the council.
“There are two paths ahead. We urge Iran to take the positive path and to consider seriously our substantive proposals, which would bring significant benefits to Iran,” British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett announced at the conclusion of the ministerial meeting.
The six ministers met in Vienna, Austria, to discuss the details of a package of benefits and penalties they will present to the Iranian government in the hopes of convincing it to suspend its nuclear program and return to negotiations that collapsed after Iran abandoned a two-year-old moratorium on enrichment activities in January.
The original negotiations included Britain, France, Germany (the EU-3) and Iran, but U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced prior to leaving for Vienna that the United States is prepared to engage directly in those discussions if Iran complies with the demands of the EU-3, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the U.N. Security Council that it suspend its nuclear activities immediately.
Rice told a reporter May 31 that the U.S. proposal is an attempt “to force a moment of truth” and see if Iran is serious about returning to negotiations.
“If Iran intends to negotiate, it's time for them to suspend and come back and negotiate. If they don't intend to negotiate, then we need to move on” and pursue action in the Security Council, she said.
Rice said that the United States, the European nations, Russia and China are all in agreement “that there have to be two plans for Iran: one, negotiations and incentives; the other, penalties and isolation.”
The secretary said the negotiations could include the establishment of an Iranian civil nuclear program that the international community would find acceptable.
“If Iran accepts the offer and suspends its enrichment activities, all the better, then we can get to the table, and we believe that there is a civil nuclear program that would meet Iran's needs but that would give confidence to the international community that they're not trying to build a nuclear weapon,” she said.
Rice expressed concern that at its present pace, Iran could reach production-scale enrichment capability by the end of 2006. She said the international community should work to prevent this from happening.
Full transcripts of Rice’s interviews with the U.S. press are available on the State Department Web site:
• Interview With CBS Evening News;
• Interview With Margaret Warner of the NewsHour With Jim Lehrer;
• Interview With Wolf Blitzer, CNN;
• Interview on ABC Nightline With Terry Moran;
• Interview on Fox News The O'Reilly Factor; and
• Interview on NBC Nightly News With David Gregory.
For additional information, see Arms Control and Non-Proliferation.
(The Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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