The European Union holds rescheduled talks with Iran about its nuclear programme today amid rising Western concern at Tehran's failure to respond to a package of incentives.
Iran postponed talks with the EU's foreign policy chief Javier Solana in Brussels yesterday in apparent anger at an exiled opposition leader's visit to the European parliament.
But Iran said chief nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani would meet Mr Solana for a private dinner today.
Mr Solana said he had agreed to a second meeting with Mr Larijani on July 11th, keeping up Western pressure for a clear answer from Iran on the package before leaders of the Group of Eight (G8) leading industrialised nations meet in St Petersburg on July 15.
Diplomats say that as Russia and China are unlikely to back any UN sanctions against Iran at this stage, there is little pressure on Tehran to respond either at the Brussels talks or before the G8 summit in Russia.
The United States has accused Iran of having a secret programme to build nuclear weapons. Iran denies the charge, saying its nuclear programme is solely for power generation.
"If Iran is trying to stall, it's not going to work," US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in Washington yesterday.
Iran says it sees ambiguities in the package of incentives put forward on June 6th by the five permanent, veto-wielding UN Security Council members - the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China - plus Germany.