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RUSSIA'S offer to enrich uranium for Iran's nuclear power plant holds good amid international efforts to solve the dispute over Iran's nuclear program, the Foreign Ministry said last Saturday in Moscow.
"Today, the Russian Embassy in Tehran gave a note to Iran confirming that Russia's proposal to Iran on creating a joint venture for uranium enrichment remains valid," the ministry said in a statement posted on its official web site.
"This proposal is Russia's contribution to the search for mutually acceptable solutions to Iran's nuclear problem by political and diplomatic means," the ministry said.
The statement came just days after officials from the European Union (EU) and Iran sat down for fresh talks on its disputed nuclear programme after a four-month hiatus.
Germany, France and Britain, which represented the EU in the talks aimed at persuading Iran to scrap uranium enrichment, froze the talks after Iran ended a voluntary suspension of uranium conversion in August.
Moscow brought up a proposal in November that would allow Iran to go ahead with a civilian nuclear programme but transfer uranium enrichment, the most sensitive part of the nuclear fuel cycle, to Russia under a joint venture.
The plan is seen as a way to minimise the chances of Iran acquiring the critical nuclear know-how to make weapons-grade components.
Iran has not rejected the plan outright. In last Wednesday's talks in Vienna, the two sides agreed to continue negotiations in January.
The United States accuses Iran of running a covert nuclear arms programme. Iran, however, says its nuclear work is designed merely to meet its energy needs.
Meanwhile Nasser Karimi of Associated writes from Teheran: Iran denied on Sunday that it had received from Russia a proposal for moving its uranium enrichment facilities to Russian territory, a compromise Europe is seeking to resolve controversy over Iran's nuclear programme.
Russia announced a day earlier that it had formally put the proposal to Tehran. Iran has so far insisted it would not agree to moving enrichment abroad, and it was not clear if Tehran's denial was an attempt to gain time without directly rejecting a proposal from Moscow, a long-time ally.
"We have not received any particular plan yet," Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told reporters. "Its quite clear that Iran will positively look at any proposal that recognise right of having nuclear enrichment on its soil."
Asefi underlined that Iran and Russia enjoy positive mutual relations and understandings in many fields.
Uranium enrichment is a key step in the nuclear process, producing either fuel for a reactor or the material needed for a warhead.
The Europeans want enrichment moved to Russia to ensure Iran cannot divert uranium for a weapons programme.
The United States accuses Iran of seeking to develop nuclear weapons. Iran insists its programme is peaceful, aimed only at generating electricity, but it has insisted it has the right to develop the entire nuclear fuel process - including enrichment - on its own territory.
Tensions have been mounting between Iran and the West, with the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency saying it is growing impatient with Tehran's resistance to European proposals. At the same time, Europe and the United States have expressed outrage by recent comments by Iran's hard-line president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, calling for Israel to be destroyed and calling the Nazi Holocaust a "myth."
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