A top Iranian nuclear official has denied saying that Tehran was ready to hold talks with the West on its atomic drive ”without preconditions”, state television reported on Tuesday.
”No comments or interview with TV networks has been made on nuclear talks or conditions,” the television quoted Iran’s envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, as saying.
The television had earlier quoted Soltanieh as saying: ”Negotiations without preconditions is Iran’s main stance on the nuclear issue.”
Instead, Soltanieh said he had referred to a letter he sent to the IAEA calling for the United Nations nuclear watchdog’s September meeting to approve an initiave to prohibit armed attacks against nuclear facilities around the world.
”The only issue that was raised was to ban threats and attacks on the world’s nuclear installations, because it is an international issue,” he said, the television reported.
United States President Barack Obama has given Iran until September to take up an offer by world powers of talks if it freezes uranium enrichment, or face harsher sanctions.
The West and Israel suspect Iran of secretly trying to build nuclear weapons, charges denied by Opec’s number two oil exporter which inists its atomic programme is for energy generation. — Sapa-AFP