The World Trade Organisation agreed today to start accession negotiations with Iran after the United States dropped a long-standing veto, diplomats said.
"It is done, it is passed," a diplomat said. Mohammad Reza Alborzi, Iran's ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, was immediately invited into the closed-door meeting of WTO's General Council, whose 148 member states take decisions by consensus.
The decision came after Iran agreed yesterday to maintain its suspension of all nuclear activities in a deal with the European Union. The United States, which had been blocking Iran's application for years, accuses Tehran of wanting to build nuclear weapons and of supporting terrorism. Iran denies the charges.
Iran applied to join the WTO in September 1996 and its candidacy was first considered in May 2001. But the United States had blocked agreement since then.