Iran nuclear talks set for next week in Vienna: Iran foreign ministry

[October 08, 2014]  DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran and major powers are set to hold multilateral and bilateral nuclear talks in the coming days in Vienna, Iran's foreign ministry said on Wednesday, less than two months ahead of a deadline for a deal to end their dispute.

A diplomatic source in the Austrian capital, where Iran and the six world powers have held a series of meetings since early this year, said the next round was expected to take place on Oct. 14-15 but that it would not include all the seven states.

Senior Iranian officials have said that Iran was likely to hold bilateral talks with the United States in Vienna and then hold a full session with the six powers in November, with a Nov. 24 target date for a comprehensive agreement.

The discussions, between Iran and the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany, are aimed at settling a more than decade long stand-off over Iranian nuclear work which Tehran says is peaceful but the West suspects may have military aims.

"I think that we will have bilateral and multilateral talks before the end of the next week in Vienna," ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham said when asked when Iran and its negotiating partners, a grouping known as the P5+1, would next meet.

Afkham, speaking at a news conference carried live on state television, did not say how long the talks would last but said without elaborating that there had been slow progress so far.

Iran rejects Western allegations that it is seeking nuclear weapons capability. It says its nuclear program is solely for peaceful purposes.

The two sides missed a self-imposed July 20 deadline for a comprehensive nuclear deal, making the new deadline Nov. 24.

There was no immediate comment from the office of European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who coordinates talks with Iran on behalf of the six world powers.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said that there was "consensus between Iran and P5+1 on fundamental issues and differences are over fine details", the official IRNA news agency reported late on Tuesday.

"There’s no dispute over whether reactors should be built in Arak or if Iran should enjoy enrichment technology or about Fordow or the end of so-called (nuclear) military activities. Differences are mainly over details and quantities," he said.

Iran has refused to close down an underground uranium enrichment plant at Fordow and a planned heavy-water reactor at Arak with the potential to yield plutonium.

Separately, a U.N. nuclear agency team is holding talks in Tehran this week, Iranian media say, in an apparent effort to advance a long-running investigation into suspected atomic bomb research by the country. Iran denies the allegations but has promised to work with the IAEA to help clear up the suspicions.

(Reporting by Michelle Moghtader, Mehrdad Balali, Fredrik Dahl in Vienna and Parisa Hafezi in Ankara, Editing by William Maclean and Dominic Evans)

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