Senior Iranian Foreign Policy Official Rejects Bilateral Meeting with US

Chairman of the Iranian parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Alaeddin Boroujerdi dismissed a US request for having a bilateral meeting with representatives of Iran on the sidelines of the negotiations between Tehran and the six world powers in Istanbul, Turkey.

During the first round of the Iran-world powers talks in Istanbul today, the US envoy called for an improvement of ties between Tehran and Washington.

A Guardian report about the content of the first round of talks between Iranian and world powers’ delegations said that the US representative to the meeting said that relations between Washington and Tehran need not be so bad.

Then after negotiating teams from Iran and the Group 5+1 wrapped up their first round of talks at Istanbul’s Lutfil Kirdar Hall at 13:30pm local time today, representatives of all the six world powers, including the US, requested to hold separate bilateral meetings with the Iranian team of negotiators in the afternoon.

Michael Mann, the spokesman for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton who presides the delegations of the six world powers, confirmed the US request – though not very explicitly – when he told the media that “all countries have expressed interest in having bilateral meetings with Iranian officials”.

A few hours later, Boroujerdi said his country had rejected the overture from Washington for a one-on-one meeting between the two delegations at the talks.

He spoke after the morning plenary session broke and plans were being formed for bilateral encounters between Iran and its six interlocutors.

“No bilateral talks with the US will be formed,” Boroujerdi told the Associated Press. “It is not Iran’s policy to have bilateral talks with the US – Iran will talk to them on the multilateral level.”

Iran and the United States have not had diplomatic ties for 33 years, since militant Iranian students took American diplomats hostage in Tehran and relations have faced additional tensions since.