MOSCOW, Dec 24: Russia on Saturday repeated its offer to process uranium for Iran’s controversial nuclear programme, a proposal Tehran has already rejected.

Moscow’s proposal to create ‘on Russian soil a joint Russo-Iranian undertaking to enrich uranium still stands’, the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement.

It said the suggestion had been put to the Iranian government on Saturday.

“This proposal represents Russia’s contribution to the search for a solution acceptable to all in the context of the settling of the situation... by political and diplomatic methods,” the statement said.

The European Union wants Iran to accept the Russian idea that enrichment operations should take place in Russia without the direct involvement of Iranian scientists.

Tehran has turned down both this offer and a ‘Libyan-style’ compromise that it should renounce sensitive activities in exchange for various types of aid.

Russia is building Iran’s first nuclear reactor.—AFP