The European Union is preparing a bold offer for Iran, including economic, nuclear, and perhaps security guarantees, to try to curb its atomic ambitions, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said on Monday.
“It will be a generous package, a bold package, that will contain issues relating to nuclear, economic matters, and maybe, if necessary, security matters,” Solana said, arriving for a meeting of EU foreign ministers.
“We are preparing a package [so] that it will be difficult for them to say no if what they really want is energy,” he said, ahead of talks between the so-called EU-three diplomatic powers; Britain, France and Germany.
Solana played down comments by Iran’s hardline President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, rejecting any new EU offer that might demand that the Islamic republic halt uranium enrichment activities.
The EU’s top diplomat said the Iranians had yet to see the Union’s offer.
The West fears that Iran is trying to develop a nuclear weapon behind the screen of a civilian atomic energy programme. Tehran says it only wants to generate energy.
The United States is seeking sanctions from the UN Security Council but it has failed to win support for the move and has given its European allies “a couple of weeks” to draft a fresh approach.
The EU, whose package must also satisfy Russia and China, has until May 19 — when negotiators from the Security Council’s five permanent members plus Germany meet in London — to complete its work. – AFP