Nuclear talks delayed over venue dispute, Iran says

West hasn’t responded to Iran’s choice of Cairo to hold talks; Russia says West and Iran behaving ‘like little children’

28 January 2013, 1:23 pm

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The Iranian heavy water reactor at Arak, one of many sites that make up the Iranian nuclear program (CC-BY Nanking10, Wikimedia Commons)

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran’s foreign minister blamed the West on Monday for holding up agreements on finding a venue to restart talks over Tehran’s nuclear program.

The comments by Ali Akbar Salehi suggest no headway has been made on Iran’s proposal for Egypt as the site to renew dialogue, more than six months since the last round of talks ended in stalemate.

It also appeared as a response to European Union claims last week that Tehran was willfully delaying new nuclear talks with the six world powers by changing venues and using other stalling tactics.

Also on Monday, Russia’s foreign minister said Iran and the West should stop behaving “like little children” and agree on where to hold talks on Tehran’s nuclear program.

Sergey Lavrov said Monday the essence of the talks was far more important than the atmosphere of any given town. He said Russia was hoping that “common sense would prevail and we will stop being capricious like little children.”