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Spotlight: Iranian nuke talks enter critical phase as deadline looms

Xinhua, March 30, 2015 Adjust font size:

Foreign ministers from major world powers and Iran on Monday hold decisive Iranian nuclear negotiations as the tough nuclear talks have entered the critical phase, one day away from the March 31 deadline.

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, as well as EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini joined the 90-minutes plenary negotiation Monday morning, a first ministerial-level plenary session since the decision to extend the deadline made in November 2014.

As the marathon negotiation enters home stretch, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said in the meeting that all sides should take the historic and political responsibility to push the negotiation forward.

Wang added that all focal points in the negotiations are related to each other, which require political decision to deal with.

The top diplomats from P5+1 countries (namely the United States, China, Russia, France and Britain plus Germany) also convened a session ahead of another round of negotiations with Iranian delegates, which was scheduled later the day.

They are expected to hammer out a framework deal over Teheran's nuclear issue before the March 31 deadlines.

Iran state news agency IRNA on Sunday quoted Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi as saying that "no deal on the Iranian nuclear program has been struck yet but many issues have been resolved."

However, a diplomatic source told Xinhua on Monday that there are still many uncertainties in announcing any achievements.

"It seems that they might be too much optimism at the beginning," the source said.

According to the source on the condition of anonymity, the possibility for the sides to reach a common understanding on Monday is very little, if still exist.

The Russian media Monday reported that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was due to leave for Moscow on Monday evening for pre-planned meetings. However, the Russia diplomat will return if there's a "realistic understanding of a deal," Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said.

German Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Sebastian Fischer on Monday told press in Berlin that there were still a number of difficult and unresolved questions in the negotiations. Endit