Press Briefing by State Department Deputy Spokesperson J. Adam Ereli on IAEA Meeting and Prospects for Iran (Excerpts)

November 24, 2004

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Q All right. If there's no follow-up on that, could you just give us some words about your hopes and expectations for the IAEA meeting that will be held on Thursday in Vienna?

MR. ERELI: Our hopes and expectations -- well, we would hope for a full and candid discussion of the Iranian nuclear program, based on the director-general's report.

We will make clear our view that this program remains an issue of serious concern with a number of unanswered questions out there that need to be addressed.

We will -- another topic of conversation will obviously be the agreement reached between Iran and the EU-3 on suspension of uranium activity. We expect that to be a subject of discussion and consensus on what action to take on the basis of that agreement. But I think, frankly, the bottom line is the Iranian activity continues to be of concern. There continue to be questions that need to be answered. And you know, we all continue to take a long-term view of this issue, looking not just at the status quo but also where we want to be. And where we want to be is in a situation where nobody has any cause for doubt or question about what Iran is up to. That certainly isn't the case today, and our goal is to create an international environment where Iran's activity in the nuclear area is -- and Iran's actions are, you know, fully consistent with international obligations, fully transparent and not threatening.

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