Stop threats then we’ll talk, Iran tells West
Foreign Desk Report

TEHRAN—Iran on Sunday told the West it would only hold talks over its disputed nuclear programme if world powers stopped threatening further punitive measures against Tehran.
“The time of using the policy of the carrot and the stick has ended,” Javad Vaeedi, a top national security official, said on the sidelines of a security conference in Tehran.
“If they (the West) want to have serious negotiations, in fair conditions and taking into account the interests of the two parties, they must first stop threatening.”
His comments came a week after the UN Security Council tightened sanctions against Tehran over its refusal to heed the world body’s calls to freeze uranium enrichment, a potential weapons-making process.
Following the sanctions resolution, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad rejected any new talks with the European Union’s foreign policy chief Javier Solana — who has represented world powers in past discussions on the nuclear crisis.
Ahmadinejad said Tehran would in future negotiate only with the UN atomic agency and would not sit down with anyone from outside the body, such as Solana, who has held two years of nuclear talks with Iran.
Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, speaking at a conference in Tehran, meanwhile refused to directly answer a question about whether Iran would continue talking to Solana.
“We are still supporters of negotiations that have a precise objective, a defined programme and are assured of providing us with results,” he said.
“We are ready to discuss any proposition in this framework, including the important questions of the world, different problems, notably that of occupation and the desire of certain countries to dominate others”.
The Security Council has repeatedly called on Iran to freeze uranium enrichment, which the West fears could be used to make nuclear weapons, but which Iran insists is only needed to make atomic fuel for power stations.
Iran is ready to negotiate with Europe over the Islamic republic’s nuclear program if there were would be “meaningful and effective” results, Iran’s foreign minister said Sunday.
Manouchehr Mottaki’s comments came just days after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad appeared to rule out any nuclear negotiations with Europe, saying the issue would only be discussed with the U.N. atomic watchdog agency.
“We have always supported negotiations that are purposeful, meaningful and effective,” Mottaki said when he was asked if Iran was ready to negotiate Javier Solana, the European Union’s foreign policy affairs chief.
Negotiations could be in any fields including the West’s wrongdoings such as “expansionism, invasion and occupation,” Mottaki said.
Last week, the U.N. Security Council passed a third round of sanctions on Iran ordering assets to be frozen of additional Iranian officials and companies with links to the country’s nuclear and missile program.
For the first time, it also banned trade with Iran in some goods that have both civilian and military use.
The U.S., Russia, China, Britain and France, along with Germany, however, also promised an improved package of incentives for Iran to restart negotiations with Solana if uranium enrichment is suspended.
Iran insists its enrichment work is intended to produce fuel for nuclear reactors that would generate electricity and has vowed to push ahead with uranium enrichment.
Mottaki said that the new round of sanctions lacked “technical and legal” justification and would discredit the Security Council.
An IAEA report in February said that while Iran had cooperated in clearing up many of the past questions over its nuclear program, it had not responded properly to intelligence forwarded by the U.S. and its allies purportedly showing nuclear weapons technology.
Iran has dismissed the intelligence as fabricated and insisted the report vindicated its nuclear program and left no justification for any Security Council sanctions.