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Tehran will be able to enrich uranium on its soil - Washington Post

IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency

New York, June 7, IRNA
Iran-EU-Nuclear Program
The confidential diplomatic package backed by Washington and formally presented to Iran on Tuesday leaves open the possibility that Tehran will be able to enrich uranium on its own soil, Washington Post said on Wednesday.

"That concession, along with a promise of U.S. assistance for an Iranian civilian nuclear energy program, is conditioned on Tehran suspending its current nuclear work until the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency determines with confidence that the program is peaceful.

"But the Bush administration and its European allies have withdrawn their demand that Iran abandon any hope of enriching uranium for nuclear power, according to several European and U.S. officials with knowledge of the offer.

"We are basically now saying that over the long haul, if they restore confidence, that this Iranian regime can have enrichment at home," Washington Post said quoting U.S. official.

"But they have to answer every concern given all that points to a secret weapons program."
"U.N. investigation so far has not found proof of a weapons program but has been unable to rule one out. Iran maintains that the program was designed for nuclear energy, not weapons.

"In private discussions among the United States and its allies concerning possible action against Iran, Germany had suggested that Iran could be allowed to continue, under strict U.N. monitoring, its current enrichment research while negotiations commenced. But the Bush administration, as well as the governments of France and Britain, disagreed, arguing that Iran must suspend the program until suspicions regarding its true nature are cleared up.

"The list of incentives that European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana detailed to Iranian officials on Tuesday was endorsed by the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany.

It contains not only the revamped American promises on enrichment but a U.S. offer to join negotiations directly if Iran suspends its program, as well as pledges of European assistance in building additional light-water nuclear power plants and support for Iranian membership in the World Trade Organization.

"We had constructive talks," Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, told reporters after the two-hour meeting in the palatial offices of Iran's Supreme National Security Council.

"There are some positive steps in it and also some ambiguities." Larijani did not elaborate, but diplomats said the atmospherics surrounding the meeting appeared to reinforce recent assurances by Iranian officials that the new proposal would be considered seriously, Washington Post said.

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