Home
Discover Islam
Quran Recitations
Lectures
Fatwa
Articles
Fiqh
E-Books
Women
Boys & Girls 
Articles
Iran will hold talks on its controversial nuclear program with global powers on Monday, a day after announcing an important advance in its capability to enrich uranium.
In what seemed a clear attempt to send a message before the talks, Tehran announced on Sunday that it had mined and enriched its first domestic uranium yellowcake, the raw material needed to produce highly-enriched uranium.
The announcement has been widely interpreted as a signal that Iran will not back down over its nuclear program, which the West believes aims to build nuclear weapons despite Tehran's insistence that its plans are peaceful.
A meeting will be held in Geneva between Catherine Ashton, the European Union's top diplomat and Saeed Jalili, Iran's chief negotiator, with full talks tentatively scheduled to resume on Tuesday morning.
Ashton will negotiate on behalf of the five UN Security Council members - Britain, France, the US, Russia and China - plus Germany. The meeting will be attended by officials from each of the countries, diplomats said.
The talks will be the first in more than a year, but there are few hopes of a breakthrough, with officials saying that securing an agreement to meet again for more substantial talks would be progress.
The West wants Iran to suspend all its nuclear enrichment plans, something which Tehran insists is not on the table at the Geneva talks.
Asked upon his arrival in Geneva whether he was optimistic about the meeting, Jalili said: "Everything depends on the other party's attitude."
The West has hit Iran with tightened diplomatic sanctions in recent months, and the US has warned of more pressure and isolation if Tehran continues its uranium enrichment activities.
Washington has said that all options, including a military strike, remain on the table if diplomatic pressure cannot be brought to bear on Iran.
But so far Iran has remained defiant in the face of the sanctions, and Sunday's announcement on yellowcake production will do little to ease the Western concerns over the deadlock.
Al Jazeera's Alireza Ronaghi, reporting from Tehran, said that the announcement was meant to set the tone for the talks.
"Iran has had this capability to produce yellowcake for a very long time, but the important thing is the timing of the announcement," he said. "Iran is trying to send a message ahead of talks that even if you build a wall around Iran, its nuclear program will go ahead."
"Iran has been trying to say that its only a matter of time to become totally self-sufficient in its nuclear program, even with the sanctions."
PHOTO CAPTION
A truck loaded with the first batch of Iranian yellowcake arrives from the southern port city of Bandar Abbas on December 5, 2010.
Al-Jazeera.net
