WTO agrees on entry talks with Iran

The World Trade Organisation agreed yesterday to start membership negotiations with Iran after the United States dropped a long-standing veto.

The US decision appeared to be the first tangible reward for Iran after it agreed on Wednesday to maintain its suspension of all nuclear activities in a deal with the European Union.

Mohammad Reza Alborzi, Iran's ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, welcomed the breakthrough at WTO's General Council, whose 148 member states take decisions by consensus.

"I take note that a decision that has long been overdue has been now established," Mr Alborzi said in remarks to the closed-door meeting.

Iran applied to join the WTO in September 1996 and its candidacy was first considered in May 2001. But Washington had blocked agreement ever since at 22 General Council meetings.

"Today this house with this decision has done service to itself by correcting a wrong," Mr Alborzi said in a statement given to journalists.

But the green light to talks from the WTO, which sets the rules for world trade, does not mean that Iran, the world's fourth largest oil exporter, will be joining soon.

Accession talks can take years, with Russia still negotiating its entry after a decade of discussions.

Iran's Commerce Minister Mohammad Shariatmadari told state radio: "Naturally, we are at the beginning of a long road."

Carlo Trojan, the EU's trade ambassador, welcomed the decision as "positive news". Joseph Akerman, a trade envoy from member Israel, said if Iran fulfills the basic principles of the WTO, "then they are welcome like any other country".

In Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the United States remained hopeful enough about EU-Iran talks to keep a commitment it made in March not to again block Tehran's application to join the WTO.

But Mr Boucher said, "I point out that process is usually a lengthy one. It can often last several years and require very complex negotiations. And it would, again, require consensus before Iran could actually join the World Trade Organisation as a member."

The US accuses Tehran of wanting to build nuclear weapons and of supporting terrorism. Iran denies the charges.

But in a policy shift in March designed to bolster EU-Tehran negotiations, the United States offered Iran economic incentives to abandon its suspected pursuit of nuclear weapons, including letting WTO accession talks start.