Nuclear talks should cover general, detailed terms: Velayati

Head of the Center for Strategic Research Studies at the Expediency Council Ali Akbar Velayati said on Monday that nuclear talks should cover both general outlines and the details.

He made the remarks on the sidelines of his meeting with visiting Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.

“Our nuclear negotiators move in line with the guidelines of the Supreme Leader of the Islamic revolution,” Velayati said.

The Iranian nuclear negotiators are obliged to move within a defined framework and one of the main principles of the framework in question calls for the talks to simultaneously focus on general outlines and details, he said.

“General and detailed issues should proceed in parallel,” Velayati said as he recalled a world experience that drawing a line between the two is anything but useful.

Referring to peace negotiations between Palestinians and Zionist regime in 2104, he said separation of general issues and details in talks is a colonial trick pursued by the Americans and Zionists.

He said that the Western governments try to take advantage of the time envisaged to work out general outlines and then prolong the process, capitalizing on the settlement of details as a bargaining chip.

He said that the Oslo and Camp David accords are good examples of efforts by the West to drag things out.

Such historical examples indicate that separation of general outlines and details in talks is not advisable, he said.

On reimposition of sanctions on Iranian oil tankers by the European Union after the European Court of Justice revoked the sanctions on the oil tankers citing lack of substantive evidence, he said Iran was under tough economic sanctions from the early stages of the Islamic revolution.

“We have learned how to overcome economic sanctions; under no circumstances will the country change its stand or give up its legitimate rights,” he said.

In the meeting, we also discussed Iran’s nuclear program, Velayati said.

Chinese foreign minister believes in the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear program and the fact that the Islamic Republic of Iran has no plan to proliferate nuclear weapons, he said.

After the meeting, the Chinese foreign minister told reporters that current level of relations between the two countries is satisfactory, Velayati said.

The two sides should do their best to raise the volume of bilateral trade to $200 billion, he said.