IRAN - Aug. 28 - Tokyo Presses Tehran To Sign Nuclear Protocol.

Visiting Tokyo, FM Kamal Kharrazi meets Japanese PM Junichiro Koizumi, who presses Tehran to sign an additional protocol to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty hoping to remove the main obstacle to a $2 bn deal to develop the Azadegan oilfield. Koizumi urges Kharrazi to allow more rigorous inspections of nuclear facilities to allay international concern about nuclear weapons. Japanese FM Yoriko Kawaguchi said Tokyo would be willing to share with Tehran its experience of signing the additional protocol with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to remove Tehran's "concerns over the possible misuse of information by the IAEA". (Kharrazi's visit comes days after the IAEA said its inspectors found traces of weapons-grade enriched uranium at the Natanz' nuclear facility, deepening US misgivings about Tehran's nuclear agenda. US concerns forced Japan to allow a June deadline to pass without signing an agreement with Tehran on developing the Azadegan oilfield. Tehran and Tokyo were on the brink of signing the flagship deal when Washington pressurised Tokyo not to go ahead.

The US feared an agreement would send "the wrong message" to Tehran at a time of international concern about its nuclear programme. Japan has long had good relations with the Islamic Republic, although it has been forced to temper the intensity of those ties at times because of the US. It is now having to steer a difficult diplomatic course between maintaining good relations with its chief security ally and with its third-largest supplier of oil. Tokyo insists that negotiations with Tehran continue and that a deal may yet be signed). Kawaguchi tried to distance the issue of Tehran's nuclear programme from the oil deal. She said: "We have not come to a point where we need to discuss these together. We pursue the [nuclear] concerns and also we pursue the goal of having the supply of oil taken care of. These are two separate policy issues and each one is important". Yoshiki Hatanaka at the International Development Centre of Japan, a think-tank, indicated Japan might be able to act as a mediator between the US and the Islamic Republic and provide Tehran with a way of signing the additional protocol without appearing to bow to US pressure. He said: "Iran is cornered over the IAEA's new conditions. It wants to find a way out and Japan might be one way of giving an indirect message to the US".