LAUSANNE: Negotiations over Iran’s nuclear programme reached a critical phase on Monday with diplomats struggling to overcome substantial differences just a day before a deadline for the outline of an agreement.

With Tuesday’s target date for a framework accord just hours away, the top diplomats from the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany were meeting with Iran to try to bridge remaining gaps and hammer out an understanding that would serve as the basis for a final accord to be reached by the end of June.

“We are working late into the night and obviously into tomorrow,” said US Secretary of State John Kerry, who has been meeting with his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif in Lausanne since Thursday in an intense effort to reach a political understanding on terms that would curb Iran’s nuclear activities in exchange for sanctions relief.

“There is a little more light there today, but there are still some tricky issues,” Kerry said.

“Everyone knows the meaning of tomorrow”. Kerry and others at the table said the sides have made some progress, with Iran considering demands for further cuts to its uranium enrichment programme but pushing back on how long it must limit technology it could use to make atomic arms.

In addition to sticking points on research and development, differences remain on the timing and scope of sanctions removal, the officials said. German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said Iran’s expectations from the talks are “very ambitious” and not yet acceptable to his country or the other five negotiating: the US, Britain, China, France and Russia.

“We will not allow a bad deal,” he said. “We will only arrive at a document that is ready to sign if it ... excludes Iran getting access to nuclear weapons. We have not yet cleared this up. “In particular, Steinmeier said the question of limits on research and development that Iran would be allowed to continue was problematic. Other officials said the issue of the scope and timing of sanctions relief was also a major sticking point.In a tweet, Gerard Araud, the French ambassador to the United States, said that “very substantial problems remain to be solved”.

In a sign that the talks would go down to the wire on Tuesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov left, just a day after arriving, to return to Moscow. His spokeswoman said he would will return to Lausanne on Tuesday only if there was a realistic chance for a deal.

Published in Dawn, March 31st, 2015

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