{{France told Iran it must cut back a key part of its nuclear programme and Tehran cast doubt on the chances of meeting a July deadline for a deal with world powers, highlighting the major hurdles negotiators still face.}}
Iran’s talks with six major powers on curbing its nuclear programme in exchange for an end to sanctions could be extended for another six months if no deal is reached by a July 20 deadline, a senior Iranian official said.
While an extension is possible, experts believe both sides may come under pressure from critics at home to seek better terms during this extra time period, further complicating negotiations.
Singling out a big gap in negotiating positions that will be difficult to overcome in less than two months’ time, France’s foreign minister said Iran should drop a demand to have thousands of uranium enrichment centrifuges.
Instead it should restrict itself to a few hundred of the machines used to increase the concentration of the fissile isotope.
Iran – which says its nuclear programme is peaceful and rejects accusations it has been seeking to develop a nuclear weapons capability – now has around 19,000 centrifuges installed, of which roughly 10,000 are operating, according to the U.N. nuclear agency.
Enriched uranium can have both civilian and military uses, depending on the degree of refinement.
“We are still hitting a wall on one absolutely fundamental point which is the number of centrifuges which allow enrichment,” Laurent Fabius told France Inter radio on Tuesday.
“We say that there can be a few hundred centrifuges, but the Iranians want thousands so we’re not in the same framework.”
Paris has long held out for strict terms in the negotiations and it was not immediately clear whether Fabius was spelling out Paris’ position or that of the six powers, also including the United States, Germany, Britain, China and Russia.
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