TEHRAN/VIENNA: Iran invited Russia, China, the European Union and others on Tuesday to visit key nuclear plants, but left out Britain, France, Germany and the United States — the countries most opposed to its nuclear program.
Iran’s surprise invitation to several ambassadors accredited to the UN nuclear watchdog in Vienna was a bid to show openness about its disputed atomic activities, which the West suspects are aimed at making nuclear bombs. Iran says its uranium programis for entirely peaceful ends.
None of the four major Western powers involved in diplomatic efforts to resolve the long-running dispute over Iran’s nuclear program — the United States, Britain, Germany and France — have received invitations from Tehran.
But Hungary, which is the current EU president, said it had received an invitation letter from Iran. EU foreign policy chief Catherin Ashton has represented the bloc in negotiations so far, not the EU presidency holders.
"We are still trying to determine who is on Iran’s invite list. We aren’t," US State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told Reuters.
A US official who spoke on condition of anonymity said neither the United States nor the EU3 — European Union members Britain, France and Germany — have been invited.
"A fair number of invitations have been issued. The pattern is clearer regarding who is not invited — the US and E3 — than who is invited," said the US official, who spoke on condition that he not be named.
"Hungary, invited as the EU Presidency, has already declined," the official added.
There was no immediate confirmation from either Hungary or the EU on whether Hungary had turned down the invitation.
Britain said "a tightly controlled visit of selected facilities is unlikely to provide the assurances needed by the international community" about Iran’s nuclear plans.
China said it had been invited while a Vienna-based diplomat said Russia, the sixth big power involved in talks with Iran, was also believed to have received an invitation.
A senior Western diplomat dismissed the planned trip as an Iranian stunt seeking to distract attention from its obligations under repeated UN Security Council resolutions calling on Tehran to suspend activity the West fears has military aims.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry said the ambassadors were invited to travel to the country before Tehran and six world powers are due to meet in Istanbul at the end of January.
They included representatives from some of the six powers, ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast told a news conference.
"They will possibly visit Iran and our nuclear facilities on Jan. 15 and 16," he said.
Iran’s ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the Vienna-based UN nuclear body, said the plan was for the group to travel to the Natanz uranium enrichment facility and the Arak heavy water reactor.
Sanctions pressure
The two sites are at the heart of Iran’s nuclear dispute with the West, which suspects the Islamic Republic is seeking to develop nuclear weapons. Iran denies this.
"Ambassadors … are invited to visit our nuclear sites, particularly in Natanz and Arak," Ali Asghar Soltanieh told Reuters in Vienna. "This is in the line of our transparent nuclear policy," he said, adding that meetings with high-ranking Iranian officials would also be organized.
Tehran and the powers agreed in Geneva last month to meet again in Istanbul in late January. The Geneva talks were the first in more than a year and also the first since tougher UN, US, and EU sanctions were imposed on Iran in mid-2010.
But the Geneva meeting made no substantial progress towards finding a solution to the nuclear row. Iran says its nuclear program is purely for peaceful electricity production and has rejected international demands to curb it.
In Beijing, the Chinese Foreign Ministry confirmed the invitation, without saying if it would go. Hungary’s foreign ministry said it was consulting EU foreign policy chief Ashton and member states about Tehran’s proposal.
Analysts saw Iran’s move as a "public relations" exercise which may do little to help resolve the nuclear row.
"However, it is a move away from all the confrontational rhetoric," Ali Ansari, an Iran expert at Scotland’s St Andrews university, said.
The IAEA regularly visits Iranian nuclear sites including Natanz but it has voiced growing frustration at what it sees as lack of Iranian full cooperation with its inspectors.
Additional reporting by Parisa Hafezi, Ramin Mostafavi, Alistair Lyon, and Krisztina Than.
