Q - About the general affairs council yesterday. You've said nothing about what was more or less decided on Iran? Can you confirm that the EU intends to present a sort of package to Teheran, "a stick and carrot"? And on the European or French side, can you confirm that talks are being held with the US to devise a package which would present, if the US accepted it, a turning around? Is there confirmation of both things?

A - Yesterday's informal discussions in the general affairs/external relations council was chiefly an informational discussion for the partners. It was to take stock of the situation after the IAEA board of governors meeting last month. At that time, it's true, there was a whole series of exchanges, discussions, and consultations, with various partners--those you cited and others of course. But it is obvious the crucial element for the exercise for the Board of Governors when it meets on November 25 will evidently be the report by the director general, Mr. El Baradei, which the board has asked him to present and which will illuminate in a way the talks among council members.

Q - Can you confirm that when the board meets on November 25, the EU will have no choice but to vote with the US to refer the Iran question to the Security Council unless Teheran changes its position between now and then?

A - First, it's not the EU as such. The EU members are conferring, are coordinating, but it is not the EU which sits at the IAEA. Second, I refer you to the agreements which were negotiated and concluded in Teheran practically a year ago to this day, by the three Europeans and by the Iranian authorities. In that agreement, there was the idea that a positive attitude, recognized as such on the part of Iran--in meeting the demands of the international community as they'd been explained, on cooperating with the IAEA, on ratifying and implementing the additional protocol on the Non-Proliferation Treaty, lastly on freezing enrichment and reprocessing activities--such an attitude would lead to a number of compensatory steps in terms of cooperation. From that standpoint, there is nothing fundamentally new. The element at this point, as I said, is that the IAEA board of governors asked the Agency, the director general, to prepare a summary report which presents a comprehensive assessment on the way in which Iran has carried out, has implemented the commitments it agreed to.

(...) Our objective all along has been to build confidence on the nature of the Iranian nuclear program. That remains our objective. But obviously there's a broad landscape out there with a number of options.

Q - Sending the dossier to the UN seems to be the toughest option. Are other 'softer' options being considered by the Europeans?

A - The board of governors controls its decisions. There is always a series of options. Diplomacy is not simply binary language. What is true, all the same, is that we are reaching a crucial phase. That's what we've been saying for several weeks and we're reaching the point at which all this will have to be evaluated, first by the director general and then by the board of governors.