UNITED NATIONS — Iran’s senior diplomat said Tuesday that Tehran was seriously considering a new offer from six world powers to resolve the dispute over its nuclear program, and he praised the package as “constructive.”
The unusually positive remarks by Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki to a small group of reporters raised hope that a negotiated solution can be found to defuse the crisis.
The U.N. Security Council has demanded that Iran suspend the enrichment of uranium that can be used for nuclear weapons, and the Bush administration has refused direct talks with Iran until it meets that condition.
During a 90-minute luncheon at Iran’s United Nations mission, Mottaki dismissed the growing speculation that Israel or the United States will strike at Iran’s nuclear facilities during President Bush’s last six months in office.
He described news reports to that effect as part of a long-running campaign of “psychological warfare.”
Yet there are signs of intensified debate within Iran’s leadership about its nuclear program. Iran has long said that it has an inalienable right to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes. But Mottaki declined three opportunities to reiterate that position Tuesday, indicating that Iran is weighing its options.
In a sign of apparent high-level debate in Iran, a top aide to the nation’s supreme religious leader made a veiled swipe Tuesday at Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has used belligerent rhetoric to defend Iran’s nuclear work.
“Officials . . . should avoid illogical and provocative sloganeering,” said Ali Akbar Velayati, a foreign-policy adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
