EU and Iran report progress in nuclear talks

ANKARA, Apr 26 (Reuters) The EU and Iran said they had made progress at talks designed to end a standoff over Tehran's uranium enrichment programme that the West fears could be used for the manufacture of nuclear weapons.

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and Iran's top negotiator Ali Larijani plan to hold a joint news conference today but have already agreed to meet again in two weeks' time. No details of the progress were immediately known.

Yesterday's talks between Solana and Larijani in the Turkish capital Ankara were extended into a dinner where they huddled together without aides for more than an hour, with the Iranian taking copious notes.

The United States and other Western powers suspect Iran has a secret nuclear arms programme. Tehran says its enrichment work is only for electricity production and is vital for its economy.

Asked by Reuters on his way into dinner if progress had been made, Larijani said: ''Yes.'' He did not elaborate.

''We had some good exchanges tonight regarding different issues, including Iran's nuclear dossier. And there are ideas on the table ... In about two weeks' time we will be having some more talks,'' he said later in remarks translated from Farsi.

Solana called the dinner session ''constructive'' and an aide confirmed the talks would resume in two weeks.

One European Union diplomat, who declined to be named, said the key to a breakthrough was finding a face-saving way for Iran to curb enrichment.

IRANIAN VOW No one had expected a breakthrough at the Ankara talks because of a new Iranian vow earlier in the week not to call off enrichment despite growing UN sanctions pressure.

Earlier, Larijani said ''irrational'' Western preconditions -- a reference to calls for a halt to all enrichment activity -- had thwarted diplomatic efforts to head off what some fear could be a slide into a US-Iranian conflict.

EU officials had said Solana would encourage Larijani at the talks to accept a ''double suspension'' -- a halt to all enrichment-related activity in exchange for shelving of action to implement UN Security Council sanctions.

That is the Council's formula to jump-start talks on trade incentives that major powers have offered Iran if it halts enrichment.

After a string of futile EU-Iran contacts stretching back almost a year, there have been diplomatic hints the two sides could entertain a compromise based on a partial or temporary suspension of Iran's programme.

They surfaced again this week, prompting Washington to deny that major powers were edging away from a UN Security Council resolution they engineered calling for a complete moratorium as a precondition for negotiations on a lasting solution.

A senior US official said yesterday: ''We're not going to support any kind of limited enrichment or a consortium inside Iran.'' Larijani offered on the eve of the talks to explore how to guarantee no military diversion of nuclear materials. But he ruled out halting enrichment efforts sited in a vast bunker shielded by anti-aircraft guns against a feared US attack.

Diplomats familiar with UN inspections in Iran say Tehran will not master major enrichment technology for several years.

''If the West really wants to block progress (towards an Iranian bomb), it is easy enough to do -- just start negotiating without preconditions, and let Iran save face and keep a small enrichment programme, with the IAEA monitoring,'' one said.

REUTERS TB BST0522