Iran Always Open to Dialog: Diplomat
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – An Iranian deputy foreign minister said diplomatic negotiations and dialogue make a pillar of the country’s foreign policy agenda.
Experience shows that Iran has been open to dialog all the time, Hassan Qashqavi said in a meeting of Iranian academics in Tehran on Friday.
“Today, the Establishment’s policy is also based on the principle of negotiation and its continuation, and if such a policy changes, neither a minister nor anybody else will be allowed to negotiate,” he noted.
Pointing to the nuclear talks between Iran and six world powers, Qashqavi said, “Negotiation means handling the nuclear issue through dialogue and diplomatic practices.”
In the meantime, the diplomat made it clear that Iran will not let its red lines crossed in the course of talks.
Among Iran’s red lines is the right to have industrial-scale uranium enrichment inside the country, he added, describing it as a national demand.
Iran and the G5+1 (Russia, China, the US, Britain, France and Germany) are in talks to hammer out a final deal to end a decade of impasse over Tehran’s civilian nuclear work.
On November 24, 2013, the two sides signed an interim nuclear deal in the Swiss city of Geneva.
The Geneva deal (the Joint Plan of Action) came into effect in January and expired in July, when the parties decided to extend negotiations until November 24 in the hope of clinching a final deal that would end a decade of impasse over Tehran’s peaceful nuclear energy program.
Meanwhile, the parties are preparing for a last-ditch effort to reach an agreement on November 18 in Vienna.
