A team of inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has arrived in Tehran on Sunday to start a new round of nuclear engagement with Iran which could lead to talks involving the six global powers.
Iran's Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi was optimistic about the outcome of the visit by the IAEA team, led by Deputy Director General Herman Nackaerts and the agency's number two Rafael Grossi.
During his interaction with the media in Addis Ababa on Saturday, Mr. Salehi also spoke about the prospects of progress in a possible big-ticket dialogue between Iran and the six global powers — United States, Russia, Britain, France, China and Germany.
Analysts say the visit by the IAEA team was more in the nature of a preparatory dialogue for a full-fledged round of talks between Iran and the P5+1 countries. Nevertheless, in the public domain, the inspectors were combative in saying they would ask questions of Iran about the possible military dimension of its nuclear programme.
Iranians, on their part, sought to focus on the covert war that had been unleashed by their foes against their country, which had recently spiked with the horrific killing of Ahmadi-Roshan, a young Iranian nuclear scientist.
