Tehran says talk of an agreement aims to ‘tarnish the climate of the talks’ and make a settlement more difficult to reach

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

Iran has denied striking a deal with the US to reduce Tehran’s potential ability to manufacture nuclear weapons, following earlier reports that an agreement had been reached.

The Associated Press said on Friday that Tehran and Washington had agreed the outline of a deal under which Iran would ship its surplus enriched uranium to Russia.

It also said negotiators had drawn up a catalogue outlining areas of potential agreement and differences in the long-running dispute.

Iran’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham said, however, that “no agreement on any nuclear topic” had been reached.

“Such news is spread out of political motives and its goal is to tarnish the climate of the talks and make it more complicated to reach a settlement,” the state IRNA news agency quoted her as saying.

The semi-official ISNA agency, citing an “informed source”, also denied the report: “The topic of transferring uranium abroad has been circulating for a while, but we haven’t had any agreement in this regard.”

Iran denies it wants to develop nuclear weapons and insists its programme is peaceful. It plans to resume talks with the US, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany in Geneva on 15 January 15, but wide gaps remain between the two sides.

Diplomats have said, however, that even agreement of a to-do-list would previously have been difficult, suggesting that at least some progress had been made.

The main point of contention is uranium enrichment, which can create both reactor fuel and fissile material for weapons.

The US has proposed that Tehran exports much of its enriched uranium stockpile, something which Iran has previously said it would not do.

AP reported diplomats saying that both sides in the talks were still arguing about the size of stockpile Iran should be allowed to retain. It currently has enough for several bombs, and Washington wants it to have substantially less.

An interim deal was struck in November 2013 for Iran to curb some aspects of its nuclear activity, including higher-grade enrichment, in return for some relief from economic sanctions. The two sides have failed, however, to meet two deadlines since on ending the standoff.