World powers should show maximum patience in the Iranian nuclear standoff and stop accusing the Islamic Republic of wasting time, a top Russian foreign ministry official said Monday.
Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, speaking in a newspaper interview, hailed a U.N. atomic agency-brokered plan for Iranian uranium to be further enriched abroad in states including Russia as a way to "cool down emotions".
"We should not give the impression that everything has stayed as it was," he told the Vremya Novostei daily. "On the contrary, we need to give the Iranians positive stimuli."
"And will it be possible to do this if it is presumed that the Iranians are wasting time?"
Ryabkov refused to be drawn on whether Russia has a deadline for Iran to answer the remaining questions on its nuclear drive. Some Western powers have suggested Iran has until December.
"Everyone must demonstrate maximum patience and concentrate on the dynamics that have built up thanks to the efforts of the six" world powers seeking to resolve the uranium nuclear crisis, he said.
The U.S. has in recent weeks been seeking a concrete commitment from Moscow to tough sanctions against Iran should the diplomacy fail, but Russia has yet to make such a statement