Iran to hold nuclear talks with three European powers on Jan 13

TEHRAN: Iran will hold nuclear talks with France, Britain and Germany on Jan 13 in Switzerland, local media reported on Wednesday, quoting a foreign ministry official.

“The new round of talks between Iran and three European countries will be held in Geneva on Jan 13,” said Kazem Gharibabadi, deputy foreign minister for legal and international affairs, according to the ISNA news agency.

He added the talks were only “consultations, not negotiations.”

The three European countries had, on Dec 17, accused Iran of growing its stockpile of high-enriched uranium to “unprecedented levels” without “any credible civilian justification.”

They also raised the possibility of restoring sanctions against Iran to keep it from developing its nuclear programme.

Iran’s top diplomat Abbas Araghchi said his country was “ready for fair and honourable negotiations” with the West.

“In exchange (for the lifting of sanctions), we will create more confidence in the peaceful nature of the Iranian nuclear programme,” he was quoted as saying on Wednesday by Tasnim news agency.

“If the other party does not like this path, it is natural that we follow our own path, as we have done in recent years,” added the foreign minister.

Iran has, in recent years, increased its manufacturing of enriched uranium such that it is the only non-nuclear weapons state to possess uranium enriched to 60%, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) nuclear watchdog said.

That level is well on the way to the 90% required for an atomic bomb.

On Nov 29, Iran held a discreet meeting with the three European powers in Geneva which Gharibabadi at the time described as “candid.”

Iran insists on its right to nuclear energy for peaceful purposes and has consistently denied any ambition of developing nuclear weapons capability.

Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the final say in all state matters, has long issued a religious decree, or fatwa, prohibiting atomic weapons.

Late on Monday, Iran’s security chief Ali Akbar Ahmadian maintained that Iran has “not changed” its nuclear doctrine against pursuing atomic weapons.

The Jan 13 talks will take place one week before Donald Trump’s return to the White House.

In 2015, Iran and world powers – including France, Britain and Germany – reached an agreement that eased international sanctions on Tehran in exchange for curbs on its nuclear programme.

But, the US, during Trump’s first term in office, unilaterally withdrew from the accord in 2018 and reimposed biting economic sanctions.

Tehran adhered to the deal until Washington’s withdrawal, and then began rolling back on its commitments.