Iran We Have Rights

Iran replies to nuclear offer

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Tehran, June 4, 2006. Khamenei said on Monday Iran would press ahead with its pursuit of nuclear energy, indicating it will not heed a U.N. demand it stop enriching uranium or face possible sanctions. REUTERS/Raheb Homavandi

August 22, 2006

By Edmund Blair

TEHRAN (Reuters) -Iran gave its formal response on Tuesday to an incentives package aimed at addressing concerns that it is seeking atomic bombs and Iranian officials said they wanted fresh negotiations with the West on the dispute.

No details of Iran's reply were immediately available but Western diplomats said they were expecting an "ambiguous" response and Tehran has indicated it would not address a key demand that it halt uranium enrichment work.

The world's fourth largest oil exporter insists it will not abandon what it calls its right to enrich uranium for use in nuclear power stations. Western countries fear Iran wants to master enrichment to give it the ability to make atomic bombs.

The U.N. Security Council -- frustrated with Iran's slow response to the incentives offer made by Britain, Germany, France, China, the United States and Russia in June -- has given it to August 31 to halt enrichment or face possible sanctions.

Iran has called the deadline illegal and worthless.

Chief nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani delivered Iran's response to foreign envoys representing the six co-sponsors of the package in Tehran, his office said.

The United States, without an embassy in Iran since 1980, was represented by the Swiss embassy.

Iranian officials said the reply would pave the way to renewed talks over a nuclear dispute which erupted four years ago with revelations that Iran had been building an advanced atomic program in secret for almost two decades.

"Iran's response will provide the West with an exceptional chance for an understanding and a return to talks," Mohammad Saeedi, deputy head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization told the ISNA students news agency.

TWO-WAY ROAD

Iran has said its reply to the offer will be "multi-dimensional," suggesting no simple 'yes' or 'no'.

"Confidence building is a two-way road, trust is always a two-way road," Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said in response to questions after a lecture in Pretoria, South Africa.

"Based on negotiations, there is a possibility for a comprehensive solution to this matter," he said.

The five Security Council permanent members plus Germany have offered Iran a range of economic, political and security incentives to halt work that could be used to make atomic bombs.

But Iran's "multi-dimensional" reply could lay bare divisions in the Council where the United States, France and Britain back sanctions but Russia and China, both key trade partners of Iran, oppose them.

"If they reject suspension (of enrichment), that's rejection of the package (for Western capitals)," said a Western diplomat. He added that Russia and China might take a different view.

"If they said suspension was negotiable, there would be pressure on (the six powers) to think about it."

Analysts say Iran is probably calculating that any move toward sanctions would start with modest steps, such as travel bans on officials or asset freezes, which it could tolerate because the country's coffers are brimming with petrodollars.

Washington says it wants a diplomatic solution to the standoff but has refused to rule out military action.

Diplomats close to the U.N. nuclear watchdog said its inspectors were recently denied access to an underground site under construction where Iran plans industrial- scale production of enriched uranium.

A senior diplomat said blocking inspectors this way could be a violation of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Iran denied hindering access to the Natanz facility.

(Additional reporting by Parisa Hafezi, Alireza Ronaghi in Tehran, Mark Heinrich in Vienna, Rebecca Harrison in Johannesburg)