guardian.co.uk
Iran presented proposals yesterday which it said were intended to resolve mounting tensions with the west, but western officials said the package did not address the most contentious issue, Tehran's nuclear programme. Officials from six countries handling nuclear negotiations with Iran, Britain, France, Germany, the US, Russia and China, are due to discuss the Iranian proposals by telephone today. But Britain made its assessment clear last night, by issuing a statement saying it was still looking forward to an Iranian response to international overtures on its nuclear programme.
The US, Britain and France are expected to spearhead a push for further sanctions against Iran, but it is unclear whether the initiative will be supported by Russia and China at the UN. Western officials who saw the Iranian document described it as a vague litany of platitudes with no concrete suggestions, littered with spelling mistakes and grammatical errors as if it had been written in haste. There was a heading on trade and investment, but nothing underneath it. There was no reference to Iran's uranium enrichment programme, which the UN security council has called on Iran to suspend. The only mention of nuclear issues was a declared aspiration to make the UN's nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) fairer and to reform the non-proliferation treaty which is up for review next year. (Read more...)
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