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Q. Let's go to Iran now. It's been rather pushed out of the limelight by the events elsewhere in the Middle East over the last six months. Are you concerned about the impasse in talks over Iran's nuclear program. Would Russia soften its opposition to additional UN sanctions against Iran if there is no progress made in these talks?

A. Normally we try to stick accurately to the agreed positions with our partners. The agreed position of the 3+3 group, or 5+1, whatever you prefer, was that we use the dual track approach, negotiations and international pressure, the international pressure being conceived for the sole purpose, to encourage Iran to negotiate and the Security Council to be used in support of IAEA, to sanction in a very targeted way, those parts of the Iranian government structure and those persons in Iran who are directly involved in the nuclear program, just to send a message and to exert pressure. So, with the adoption of the resolution in June last year, all conceivable areas having anything to do with the nuclear program, have been targeted already. So any new sanctions would have nothing to do with the original purpose of the exercise and would in fact be aimed at suffocating the Iranian economy. Consideration number two, when we agreed collectively to go to the Security Council and endorse sanctions in support of IAEA demands to Iran, we have been repeatedly saying that we must stick together and the Americans and the Europeans were telling us the same. And while we painfully negotiated the last resolution -- it touches on quite a number of areas which are of economic interest to Russia, to China, to some other countries, so it was not easy to negotiate -- we did eventually reach a deal, our friends in the United States and Europe immediately added their own unilateral packages, in fact introducing those very sanctions which during the negotiations in the Security Council they agreed to drop. It's not a very decent approach to negotiating a collective position. So with all these considerations, we don't see any possibility for additional, international, universal sanctions on Iran. But your first question, whether we are concerned with the lack of negotiating momentum, yes we are and we have been encouraging our partners in 3+3 not to make this pause too long and not to forget about the need to come back to the negotiating table. At the beginning of the year there were two meetings between 3+3 headed by Cathy Ashton and the Iranian delegation which did not produce any practical result but which were important to understand that unless we become creative, we would not be able to move. After all, with North Korea, the Americans show quite a lot of creativity and a similar intellectual effort could be made on Iran as well. Last November we suggested to our partners in 3+3 that the basic position paper which we gave to Iran I think a couple of years ago could be additioned by some kind of a road map, which would describe a step-by-step approach and the logic which I would call action for action. Iran does something specific, for example resuming the application of additional protocol to the safeguards agreement with the IAEA, and we say, agree not to introduce any new unilateral sanctions. And then when Iran does something else, expanding access for the IAEA to the places where the agency want to go, then we suspend sanctions. And so on and so forth. The 3+3 group accepted the logic of step-by-step and this reciprocity approach but we have to be specific and show to Iran that if it cooperates, if it answers satisfactorily the IAEA demands, then it should see the light at the end of the road.

Q. What is Russia's assessment of how soon Iran could acquire a nuclear bomb?

A. We don't have any proof that Iran has taken a political decision to produce a bomb. And whatever information IAEA has does not support the conclusion that Iran is already making a bomb.

The IAEA has access to all sites which Iran legally must show to the inspectors. Iran, does not apply, as I said, the additional protocol, and modified code 3.1, which are not obligatory, but which I think are very important, especially for Iran because apart from its rights under the non-proliferation treaty, Iran has quite important obligations, obligations related to the need to ensure the exclusively peaceful nature of the nuclear program, and there are some questions that the international community wants to clarify. So the IAEA resolutions, the Security Council resolutions, are aimed exactly at this and they must be implemented. But Iran must see the light at the end of the tunnel as I said, and the conclusions of the agency would be the crucial criteria. So far, as I said, they cannot confirm the exclusively peaceful nature of the Iranian nuclear program, but they cannot conclude that the Iranian nuclear program has a military dimension. So it's a process which can only be successful if we count not on new sanctions and threats, but on negotiations, as any other situation in the world, actually.

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