Tehran hopes that talks to be held this week by the International Atomic Energy Agency on its nuclear program will be free of “political pressure,” AFP reported.
“All our efforts and our emphasis in our talks were to allow the International Atomic Energy Agency to do its technical work away from the destructive and evil pressures of some parties,” Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei was quoted as saying in a press conference.
Baghaei was referring to meetings held between Iranian officials and the U.N. nuclear watchdog’s chief Rafael Grossi, who visited Iran on Wednesday.
Grossi’s visit, his first since May, was made ahead of the agency’s Board of Governors meeting this week that is expected to pass a tough new resolution against Tehran for breaching the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.
Baghaei told reporters that he hopes that Britain, Germany and France will “allow the issues between Iran and the [IAEA] agency to continue in a technical way and away from political pressures and considerations.”
He went on to praise Grossi’s visit as “beneficial and positive,” claiming it resulted in “good understandings” between Iran and the IAEA.
On Saturday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said “there is still an opportunity for diplomacy” over the country’s nuclear program, though he warned the opportunity was “limited.”
He added that the Islamic Republic was ready for both “confrontation” and “cooperation,” depending on the path chosen by the international community.
During a news conference in Tehran on Thursday, Grossi cautioned against a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.
“I say this with regards to Iran … , nuclear installations should not be attacked,” he said, in an apparent message to Jerusalem.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said earlier in the week that Iran was “more exposed than ever to strikes on its nuclear facilities. We have the opportunity to achieve our most important goal—to thwart and eliminate the existential threat to the State of Israel.”
The Israeli Air Force is believed to have knocked out the Islamic Republic’s air defenses during its attack on Oct. 26.
In addition, a recent Axios report suggested that the Israeli airstrikes on Iran last month destroyed a secret nuclear-weapons research facility in Parchin, 19 miles southeast of Tehran.
The clandestine site held sophisticated equipment used for testing explosives needed to detonate nuclear devices, the report read, citing three U.S. officials, one current Israeli official and one former Israeli official.
The Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security acquired high-resolution satellite imagery of the facility, which showed that it was completely destroyed in Israel’s attack last month.
