British Activist: London Attempting to Scuttle Iran-G5+1 Talks

Spokesman of the ‘Stop the War Coalition’ in Britain Chris Nineham warned about London’s destructive role in the talks among the world powers about Iran, and said Britain is attempting to push the world powers’ nuclear negotiations with Iran into failure.

“There are some behind-the-stage talks and London’s useless and extremist role in these talks can endanger the process of the negotiations (with Iran),” Nineham told FNA on Tuesday.

He referred to the radical remarks made by British Foreign Secretary William Hague about the negotiations between Iran and the world powers, and said, “The British government tries to push the negotiations into failure by increasing (the world powers’) demands from Iran.”

William Hague had earlier said that Western powers are determined to keep up pressure on Iran over its uranium enrichment.

“When sanctions were weaker than they are now, of course, Iran was continuing with its nuclear program, and indeed it may be the imposition of sanctions, the intensification of sanctions that is coming over the next few months that has contributed to Iran’s readiness to come back to the negotiating table,” Hague added.

“So, it certainly won’t be our approach to lift sanctions in the hope that something will emerge from Iranian negotiators. We will keep up the pressure,” Hague reiterated.

After a year of stalled talks, Iran and the Group 5+1 (the five permanent UN Security Council members plus Germany) eventually accepted last month to resume their negotiations in Istanbul, Turkey, on April 14 and in case of good progress hold a second round of talks in Iraq’s capital city, Baghdad.

The two sides attended two meetings at Istanbul’s Lutfil Kirdar Hall on Saturday. Ashton led the delegations of the world powers, while the Iranian side was headed by chief negotiator and Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Secretary Saeed Jalili.

Both sides voiced satisfaction with the results of the talks and are now working on a draft agreement on cooperation before the start of the Baghdad talks.