Iran nuke talks start

ISTANBUL — World powers and Iran launched a new round of negotiations in Istanbul on Saturday, aiming to resolve a long-standing dispute over Tehran’s nuclear program that threatens to spark a new war in the Middle East.

“Delegates have gone in… plenary is just getting started,” a diplomat close to the negotiations said.


Diplomats say the round, the first in 15 months, is unlikely to result in a major breakthrough but offers a chance to resume dialogue and dampen speculation that Israel might launch military strikes to prevent its arch enemy from acquiring nuclear arms.

Global fuel prices have risen this year amid deepening tensions over the nuclear program, which Iran says is for peaceful purposes.

Iran must show in Istanbul that it is willing to enter “serious engagement”, one senior diplomat said, suggesting Saturday’s discussions were unlikely to go into detailed issues.

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“My tip is to set your sights low,” the diplomat said. “It is not part of our game plan … to lay out a long list of specific demands and conditions. They know what we think about all these things.”

Iran says it will propose “new initiatives” in Istanbul, but it is unclear whether this means it is now prepared to discuss curbs to its uranium enrichment program, which the West suspects has military links.

“Iran is sending signals they want a serious and constructive meeting,” another diplomat said before the meeting between Iran and the United States, France, Russia, China, Germany and Britain and their main representative, European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton.

MSNBC’s Richard Lui speaks with former U.S. Ambassador to Morocco Marc Ginsberg about North Korea’s suspected plans for a new nuclear test, and the deployment of a second U.S. aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf ahead of nuclear talks with Iran.

Both sides say they are ready at the meeting to work towards resolving the deepening dispute over the nuclear program that Iran says has purely peaceful purposes.

“For their own reasons, each side wants to give diplomacy a chance at this point, to start a process rather than to force a quick fix,” said analyst Michael Adler at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

The West accuses Iran of seeking to develop a nuclear weapons capability. Israel – believed to be the only Middle East state with an atomic arsenal – sees Iran’s atomic plans as a threat to its existence. Iran has threatened to retaliate for any attack by closing a major oil shipping route.

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