OMAN FM RETURNING TO IRAN

C O N F I D E N T I A L MUSCAT 000231 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/20/2016 TAGS: PREL KNNP PARM ETTC IR MU SUBJECT: OMAN FM RETURNING TO IRAN REF: A. STATE 19516 ¶B. MUSCAT 134 ¶C. MUSCAT 162 Classified By: Ambassador Richard L. Baltimore III. Reason: 1.4 (b, d). ¶1. (C) On February 18, MFA International Organizations Department Chief Ambassador Talib bin Miran al-Raisi affirmed to Pol/E Chief that Minister Responsible for Foreign Affairs Yusuf bin Alawi will "soon" be making a return visit to Tehran. Ambassador al-Raisi did not provide details on the purpose of the trip, but he mentioned it in the context of Pol/E Chief's demarche on the IAEA Board's decision to report Iran to the UN Security Council (ref A). As reported in ref B, FM Bin Alawi had returned from Iran January 30 carrying a proposal from Tehran to delay the IAEA's action to give Iran time to reach an enrichment deal with Russia. ¶2. (C) Reacting to the USG demarche and P/E Chief's concern that some key MFA officials may not be well apprised of Iran's poor compliance record with the IAEA (ref C), Ambassador al-Raisi underscored that his department has fully briefed Bin Alawi on the technical aspects of Iran's confrontation with the IAEA. He observed that he and his disarmament expert from the Omani mission in Vienna, Abdullah al-Amri, had conducted their own visit to Iran in the past, and have been following the Iranian nuclear file in detail since 2003. He added that he provides the Minister with regular updates, and even conducted a workshop at the MFA's Diplomatic Institute shortly before the Minister's last trip to Iran to brief the delegation on nuclear issues. ¶3. (C) Ambassador al-Raisi said that he had warned his colleagues that there was little chance the IAEA would not report Iran to the UNSC. He was reassured by the USG's determination to continue pursuing a diplomatic resolution to the current impasse. Despite conflicting and unhelpful statements coming out of Tehran, Ambassador al-Raisi said he was nevertheless optimistic that Iran and Russia would hammer out an enrichment deal prior to the IAEA's March 6 report to the UNSC. But al-Raisi was more dubious as to whether such an enrichment deal would guarantee the end of Iran's own efforts to master the enrichment cycle. BALTIMORE