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Iran says nuclear talks postponed until Rouhani appoints top negotiator

Iran Materials 20 August 2013 11:46 (UTC +04:00)
The talks on Iran's nuclear program are to be postponed, until president Hassan Rouhani appoints new top nuclear negotiator, Iranian Foreign Ministry's spokesman Abbas Araqchi said.
Iran says nuclear talks postponed until Rouhani appoints top negotiator

Azerbaijan, Trend, Aug. 20 /N. Umid, S. Isayev

The talks on Iran's nuclear program are to be postponed, until president Hassan Rouhani appoints new top nuclear negotiator, Iranian Foreign Ministry's spokesman Abbas Araqchi said, IRINN TV reported live.

Araqchi made the remarks during a press conference.

He said that the time of upcomming nuclear talks with six powers (five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany) would be scheduled after appointment of Iran's top nuclear negotiator.

Before, some unofficial reports have been released on Iran's media outlets about transferring the responsibility of nuclear talks from Supreme National Security Council to Foreign Ministry.

The EU's top diplomat Catherine Ashton, who leads P5+1 in nuclear talks with Iran, called for a resumption of the talks in a phone conversation on August 17 with Iran's new Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.

Ashton said that she and Zarif would meet soon.

Araqch said that Iran wants meaningful negotiations which have specific date framework and results.

Iran and P5+1 held their latest round of negotiations on April 6 in the Kazakh city of Almaty, without any result. An earlier meeting had been held in Almaty on February 26-27.

The U.S. and its Western allies suspect Iran of developing a nuclear weapon - something that Iran denies. The Islamic Republic has on numerous occasions stated that it does not seek to develop nuclear weapons, using nuclear energy for medical researches instead.

Despite the rules enshrined in the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) entitling every member state, including Iran, to the right of uranium enrichment, Tehran is now under several rounds of UN Security Council sanctions for turning down West's calls to give up its right of uranium enrichment.

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