Solana's remarks followed a visit by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu to Iran this weekend. Speaking after talks with Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, Saeed Jalili, on Sunday, Davutoğlu offered Turkey as the venue for the upcoming talks. Davutoğlu said Turkey won't support further sanctions on Iran and called for talks to resolve the dispute.
After noting that Ankara had received no information on the issue from the Iranian side, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Burak Özügergin told reporters during a regular press briefing held on Wednesday: “Our door is always open. We want the parties to focus on the problem and start negotiations before tension emerges.”
The US, Israel and the EU fear that Iran is using its nuclear program to develop nuclear weapons. But Tehran says the program serves purely civilian purposes and that it has the right to enrich uranium for use in nuclear power plants. The talks will be the first since a 2008 session in Geneva foundered over Iran's refusal to discuss enrichment.
Turkey's involvement in the Iran nuclear dispute is not new and its recent efforts have no relation with being or not being the host of upcoming talks, Özügergin also said.
Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani, then the country's top nuclear envoy, and Solana had held talks in Ankara in April 2007, hosted by then-Foreign Minister and current President Abdullah Gül. At the time, Solana and Larijani met for two straight days of talks.
