Ireland, and the EU as a whole, have a number of long-standing concerns in relation to Iran. These include concerns about aspects of Iran's nuclear programme, human rights issues, Iran's responsibilities in the fight against terrorism, and Iran's attitude to the Middle East peace process. These concerns were reiterated most recently by the European Council in December 2004. In seeking to address these concerns, the EU is engaged with Iran in a number of areas in an effort to achieve progress by dialogue and negotiation. Following the Paris agreement with Iran in November 2004, the EU is engaged in negotiations with Iran aimed at reaching, as an integrated package, an agreement governing political relations, a trade and co-operation agreement and a lasting resolution of the nuclear issue. These negotiations are being advanced in formal sessions in Brussels and Tehran and in working groups at Geneva between the UK, Germany and France, along with the Presidency and High Representative Solana and Iran. The most recent working group meetings took place on 19 April. I refer the Deputy also to my detailed statement on this issue in reply to Question No. 34 on 28 April 2005.
The EU engages with Iran on human rights issues through a formal EU-Iran Human rights dialogue. We have been concerned that, after some initial improvement, progress in improving human rights protection in Iran has been disappointing. The General Affairs and External Relations Council in October 2004 concluded that the dialogue had not so far produced worthwhile results, but that it still offered potential for engaging with Iran on the issue. The Council decided to send a troika mission to Iran to discuss ways to improve the operation of the dialogue. The troika mission has just visited Tehran, on 27 April, and we will be considering its findings at working group level and in due course at the General Affairs and External Relations Council. The EU is engaging with Iran in these various contexts in a genuine and forthright manner and is committed to seeking agreements which will resolve existing concerns and put the relations between the EU and Iran on a better footing. Success will depend on the extent to which Iran is prepared genuinely to seek to reach agreement with us.
