Araqchi: Iranˈs Rights Are Red Lines In Nuclear Talks

Tehran, May 18, IRNA – Senior member of Iranˈs nuclear negotiating team said reducing Arak power plant capacity is ridiculous and the nature of heavy water of the power plant should not change. Abbas Araqchi continued that maintaining Iranˈs rights are the red lines of the negotiation. In a live interview with IRIB TV Channel 2, Araqchi explained on the 4-day negotiations between Iran and Group 5+1 in Vienna and said that since the beginning we knew that these talks would be very difficult and viewpoints of the two sides are not close to each other. He reminded that to reach the final agreement text, we need time, discussion, dialogue and more initiatives and in the past three rounds of talks we tried to discuss on general issues and to make our viewpoints closer to each other. Araqchi explained that in the past three rounds, we discussed essentials and now we are facing with many different issues to reach the final agreement, so it needs more discussions to be done. He stressed that we thought we could enter into compiling final agreement text phase, but differences in a number of issues still remain. In the past 4 days, intensive talks in all levels, including between Zarif and Ashton, deputies and experts were done bilaterally, trilaterally and multilaterally to make viewpoints close to each other, Araghchi said. Referring to concerns of the other side about Arak power plant, the Deputy Foreign Minister in Legal and International Affairs said that we believe it is possible to remove the concerns by using technology and we can produce plutonium at minimized level, but maintain the nature of heavy water of the power plant. To remove the concerns and how to implement the changes are the issues of our discussion with Group 5+1, now. He said decreasing capacity of Arak power plant, which is 40 mega watts, is reidiculous. The senior diplomat reminded that our red line in the negotiation is maintaining Iraniansˈ rights in the issue of nuclear energy and it is one of our principles in the talks with Group 5+1 and that enrichment should continue./end