Iran has the "absolute right" to uranium enrichment, Tehran's chief negotiator at talks in Baghdad with world powers, Saeed Jalili, said on Thursday. Peaceful nuclear energy and uranium enrichment is our "absolute right," Jalili told a news conference. Enrichment can be used for peaceful purposes but also to build a nuclear weapon. It is the international community's main concern over Iran's nuclear ambitions.
The world powers involved in the talks with Iran are focused on getting Tehran to suspend its production of uranium enriched to 20 percent, and for it to send its existing 20-percent stockpile out of the country in a swap for reactor fuel. But Jalili signalled that all signatories to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), including Iran, had a right to enrichment. "We insist on the right of having a peaceful nuclear energy cycle and enrichment. This is the inalienable right of the Iranian nation," he said.
"This is a peaceful activity under the supervision of the IAEA, and it is the inalienable right of Iran and they (the P5+1 group of world powers) confirmed this in the meeting," he said. He added, however, that "it can be an issue of discussion for co-operation." The P5+1 - grouping the United States, Britain, France, Germany, China and Russia - gave no indication that they accepted 20 percent enrichment as Iran's "right".
"Iran declared its readiness to address the issue of 20-percent enrichment and came with its own five-point plan, including their assertion that we recognise their right to enrichment," the P5+1's representative, EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, said in a separate news conference prior to Jalili's. Iran's counter-proposal included a reference to a religious edict Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, made against possessing nuclear weapons, and the respect of NPT members' right to enrichment.
It also included non-nuclear issues, such as energy co-operation and regional security topics. Jalili said the two days of talks in Baghdad in which the P5+1 unsuccessfully tried to coax Iran to accepting a number of incentives in return for halting 20 percent enrichment and other aspects of its nuclear programme were "lengthy and detailed, but unfinished."
"We had serious and fundamental talks" during which Iran made "serious proposals" to the world powers, he said. He said Iran was still prepared to discuss the issue of 20-percent enriched uranium and the issue of nuclear fuel for Iran's Tehran research reactor, and that "we were even ready to continue talks into tomorrow (Friday)" in Baghdad. Ashton earlier said another round of talks between Iran and the P5+1 would now take place in Moscow on June 18-19. Jalili said: "We hope that this path of talks for co-operation will continue as the only path and that we have successful, progressive talks."
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