Ankara, Montreux: Iran on Tuesday rejected as “unacceptable” a demand by US President Barack Obama that Tehran freeze its sensitive nuclear activities for at least ten years, the semi-official Fars news agency reported.
“Obama’s stance ... is expressed in unacceptable and threatening phrases ... Iran will not accept excessive and illogical demands,” Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif was quoted as saying by Fars.
“Tehran will continue nuclear negotiations with the six powers,” he added.
In an interview with Reuters on Monday, Obama said Iran must commit to a verifiable halt of at least ten years on sensitive nuclear work for a landmark atomic deal to be reached between Tehran and six major powers.
Iran and the US on Tuesday returned to the negotiating table for a second day of talks, as a political storm over the issue unfolded thousands of kilometres away in Washington.
By the shores of Lake Geneva in the town of Montreux, US Secretary of State John Kerry met Zarif as they try to pin down a political framework for a deal by a March 31 deadline.
The US and Iranian sides met for two hours on Tuesday morning before taking a break, according to US officials. The officials said they expected the talks would resume later and likely continue through Netanyahu’s address to a joint session of Congress, which will be delivered in the late afternoon local time in Montreux.
“We’re working away, productively,” Kerry told reporters.
‘Issues’
“We are moving and we are talking to be able to make progress,” said Zarif. “There are issues and we want to address them. But there is a seriousness that we need to move forward. As we have said all along we need the necessary political will to understand that the only way to move forward is to negotiate.”
Few details of the emerging deal have publicly come to light so far, but aides to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have threatened that may change when the Israeli leader makes a controversial address to the US Congress later on Tuesday.
Kerry and his staff have warned Netanyahu against betraying US trust by revealing classified briefings about the course of the negotiations.
Netanyahu’s lobbying trip to Washington is seen as a last-ditch bid to derail one of the last key goals of President Barack Obama’s foreign policy.
But the US insists that a deal forged through diplomacy would be the best way to ensure Iran does not acquire a nuclear bomb.
Iran wants a swift lifting of the sanctions in any deal curbing its nuclear programme — one of the sticking points in high-level negotiations continuing in Switzerland this week.
Obama’s comment about the time frame for a freeze represents one of the US government’s strongest signals yet of its red line for a successful agreement.
