Another EU Failure -- Iran Will Not be Moved

Those oh-so-sophisticated Europeans, masters of diplomacy that they are, have blown it once again. Deutsche Welle reports:

Iran on Wednesday stuck by its decision to resume sensitive nuclear fuel cycle work, accusing the European Union of damaging diplomatic efforts to resolve a crisis over its nuclear program.

The comments came the day after Britain, France and Germany -- who have been trying to convince Iran to limit its nuclear drive -- announced they had cancelled talks scheduled for next week.
....
"The Europeans are to blame for unilaterally interpreting and violating the Paris Agreement," [foreign ministry spokesman Hamid Reza] Asefi said, repeating Iran's contention that it has the right under the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) to produce its own nuclear fuel."The Europeans ignored Iran's rights."

But, confident of their sophisticated powers of persuasion, the European diplomats [did I mention that they were "sophisticated"?] are not giving up.

Despite calling off the negotiating meeting, the European powers are still keen to talk to Iran about its sensitive nuclear program, according to French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy.

Douste-Blazy said the EU-3, acting on behalf of the European Union, were not ending the discussions.

"We are suspending the negotiations," he told France Inter radio. "But at the same time, we think it is still possible to talk to them ... There is no reason to close the door on Iran."

I suppose that it would be crass and "American" of me to point out that they have little choice at this point. Their failure to achieve any progress with Iran leaves them with no options other than to go to the UN Security Council, and we all know just how effective that will be with Russia and China both promising to protect Iran from UN sanctions.

Maybe there is some other option and I'm just too "unsophisticated" to see it. I sure hope so.

Read the article here.

UPDATE:

Reuters reports:

VIENNA - France, Britain and Germany are preparing to call an emergency meeting of the U.N. nuclear watchdog’s governing board to send Tehran to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions, diplomats said on Thursday.

The so-called EU3 were consulting with others on the 35-nation International Atomic Energy Agency board in preparation for calling an early meeting after IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei issues a report on Iran due on Sept. 3, IAEA diplomats said.

But there are difficulties:

Some states, however, were opposed to an early meeting and could block it, diplomats said. These included the Non-Aligned Movement, which holds a third of the seats on the board.

“The Chinese and the Russians are lobbying against it,” the EU3 diplomat said, adding: “The NAM are also opposed.”

And so they are having meetings on having meetings which will result in a decision to have another set of meetings, and so it goes in the "community of nations."

Read it here.