Details of a closed door meeting between top Iranian nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani and the EU’s foreign policy chief Javier Solana have been revealed by an anonymous diplomat who says Iran’s long list of conditions include a complete halt in activity, regarding Iran, at the UN Security Council and the right to nuclear fuel technology on its soil.
"In return for this, Larijani said the Iranians would consider, consider not actually carry out, a two-month halt in enrichment. It was all very conditional," the diplomat said.
News of the Iranian offer had raised hopes of a breakthrough in the international standoff over Iran's nuclear ambitions but the diplomat said that Mr Larijani's extensive conditions had dashed these hopes.
"There was not any new offer on the table from the Iranians. It was all incredibly conditional and all temporary," the diplomat said, adding that the suspension would come before negotiations.
Unacceptable
The conditions are "unacceptable" to the six world powers offering Iran talks on a package of trade and other benefits because they would guarantee Tehran the right to sensitive nuclear work and protect it from any punitive UN action.
Enrichment is the strategic process which makes nuclear reactor fuel but the United States is concerned that Iran is using that process to create a nuclear weapon.
Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States want a full and unconditional suspension of uranium enrichment to start the negotiations.
Gregory Schulte, the US ambassador to the nuclear watchdog the IAEA, welcomed “progress" made in the Larijani-Solana talks but added that as Iran has failed to suspend uranium enrichment "we will be looking to move forward in the (United Nations) Security Council with the sanctions regime."
Mr Schulte told reporters that if Iran did suspend enrichment this would have to be "not for one or two months" but for "as long as negotiations proceed" and without preconditions.
Iran has refused to suspend enrichment and defied a UN Security Council August 31 deadline for it to freeze the strategic nuclear fuel work; it now faces the possibility of sanctions against it.
But IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei said again that negotiation remains the "best option to find a durable solution" to the Iranian nuclear crisis, adding, "The window of opportunity however is not very long."