An informed source has denied the report that Iran is considering a new nuclear proposal presented by the United States at the talks on Tehran's nuclear program.
"The details which are published by media based on their speculations are not true," the source told the Fars news agency on Friday.
Two unnamed diplomats allegedly told the Associated Press on Thursday that Iran was considering a US proposal at nuclear talks that would allow it to keep more of its nuclear infrastructure intact while still reducing its stockpile of low-enriched uranium (LEU) through shipping some of it out of the country.
Tehran's uranium enrichment program is at the heart of the dispute over its nuclear activities. Iran and the P5+1 (the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany) are holding talks to work out a long-term settlement to the dispute by a self-imposed target date of November 24.
Iran is refusing US demands that it cut the number of working enriching centrifuges from nearly 10,000 to only a few thousand. That issue has been the main stumbling block to progress since the talks began early this year.
Diplomats told the AP last month that US had begun floating alternates to reducing centrifuges that would eliminate the disagreement but still accomplish the goal of increasing the time Iran would need to amass enough fissile material to make a nuclear bomb if it decides so.
Tehran denies the allegation that its nuclear work may be aimed at developing the capability to build nuclear weapons and says the program is meant only for peaceful purposes, such as electricity generation.
Among the alternates was an offer to tolerate more centrifuges if Tehran agreed to reduce its stockpile of low-enriched uranium.
Back then, Iran was non-committal, the AP claimed. But the two diplomats said on Thursday it recently began discussions with Moscow on possibly shipping some of its low-enriched stockpile to Russia for future use as an energy source. Russia supplies fuel for Iran's existing nuclear reactor in Bushehr.
The diplomats stressed the discussions were preliminary and Iran had made no commitment.
