Unofficial translation from Russian

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Question: What is the position of Russia at tomorrow's meeting on Iran in Berlin?

Foreign Minister Lavrov: Russia's position on Iran is invariable. We are for dispelling all the concerns the international community has. This is the focus of the related IAEA activities, which we support in every way. When we gathered at the end of January in London, the European trio, Russia, the United States and China, we reached an agreement there that after two IAEA Board meetings, with their results duly reported to the UN Security Council, we would consider the possibility to support via the UNSC the process which the IAEA directs. This question is now being discussed in the Security Council. We want the Security Council to do precisely what we were negotiating about and what is necessary for clarifying all the questions still outstanding on a professional, unpoliticized basis.

In addition, on the proposal of our European colleagues, in Berlin at the meeting of the trio, Russia, the US and China at the Foreign Ministers level, a strategy to deal further with the Iranian nuclear problem will be discussed. Naturally, we will argue that this strategy should be based on the professionalism of IAEA, since it is this Agency that has to monitor the fulfillment of the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons, and that the sole topic of our talks on that strategy should remain the nonproliferation regime and the necessity to prevent its violation. Of course, all this has to be done solely by politico-diplomatic methods, as many of our European colleagues and the Chinese friends have said on more than one occasion. Any ideas of a coercive, force-based solution to this question are extremely counterproductive and cannot be supported.

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