TEHRAN, Jan 16: Iran voiced optimism on Sunday about negotiations with the European Union on its nuclear programme and a possible trade deal and said there was no need to involve Washington in the talks right now.

The European Union last week resumed talks with Iran, suspended for about 18 months, regarding a possible Trade and Cooperation Agreement with Iran. Negotiations on a possible trade deal were frozen due to increasing EU concerns about Iran's nuclear ambitions.

Tehran's decision late last year to suspend sensitive nuclear work and enter negotiations with the EU on its nuclear programme opened the way for the trade talks to resume.

Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi, speaking at a weekly press briefing, described the trade talks held in Brussels last week as "very positive". "Europe had some proposals which we studied and offered them our suggestions. We agreed to continue the talks in March in Tehran," he said.

Negotiations about Iran's nuclear programme, which Tehran says is aimed at generating electricity, not making bombs, will resume in Geneva this week, he added. Asked whether the nuclear talks would progress better if the United States participated, Asefi said:

"There is no need for the Americans to join the (Iran-EU) talks. Negotiations are progressing well." European diplomats acknowledge that the nuclear talks with Iran would have a greater chance of success if Washington threw its full support behind the negotiations instead of the lukewarm backing it has given so far.

UN inspectors last week took samples at a military base near Tehran where Washington suspects Iran had been conducting tests aimed at producing nuclear weapons. Mr Asefi said Iran was confident that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which had waited several months to be allowed to visit the site, would find no wrongdoing.

"We know what the result will be because we know we haven't done anything illegal. When the agency's assessment comes, it will be clear," he said. Iran says it has the right to develop a civilian nuclear energy programme and accuses the West of forcing it to carry out much of its atomic work in the past in secret.

German prosecutors last week said four special generators which were due to be illegally exported to an Iranian nuclear plant had been seized. Mr Asefi said Iran was only aware of media reports about the seizure, but if true, "it is one of the unreasonable limitations which are practised against Iran and we have already said that such limitations must be lifted." -Reuters