International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) deputy head for
safeguards Olli Heinonen said on Thursday that his agency's talks
with Iran on the latter's nuclear dispute witnessed "some important
steps."
"We had constructive discussions and made some important steps,"
Heinonen said following three rounds of talks with Iranian nuclear
officials.
"We will continue discussions in coming weeks," he said.
Iran's deputy
nuclear negotiator Javad Vaeedi (R) speaks to journalists as
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) deputy director Olli
Heinonen listens during a news conference in Tehran July 12,
2007.
An IAEA team led by Heinonen arrived in Iran on Wednesday
morning in a bid to draw up a framework to resolve the dispute over
the country's nuclear program.
Meanwhile, Iran's official IRNA news agency quoted Javad Vaeedi,
Deputy Secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, as
saying that Iranian and IAEA officials made a "breakthrough" on
drawing up a benchmark to settle the technical dispute.
The two sides reached substantial agreement on composition of
the benchmark, Vaeedi said at the end of the latest round of talks
with the IAEA officials.
"We divided subjects of the nuclear program into two parts --the
past and present," Vaeedi said. "We made breakthrough in both
parts."
The idea to draw up the framework was put forward by Iran's top
nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani last month when he was in Madrid,
Spain for talks with the European Union foreign policy chief Javier
Solana about Iran's nuclear program.
Late last month, in a meeting with the IAEA Director General
Mohamed ElBaradei in Vienna, Larijani invited a delegation from the
IAEA to visit Iran and hold talks with Iranian officials
overdrawing an action plan to put an end to the stalemate between
Iran and the UN nuclear watchdog.
(Xinhua News Agency July 13, 2007)
