U.S. is changing approach toward Iran: Iranian FM

TEHRAN,Feb.6(MNA) – Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said on Monday he saw U.S. Vice President Joe Biden’s offer this weekend of bilateral dialogue between their two countries as a sign of a change in approach to Tehran by Washington, Reuters reported. “As I have said yesterday, I am optimistic, I feel this new administration is really this time seeking to at least divert from its previous traditional approach vis-a-vis my country,” Salehi told the German Council on Foreign Relations. Salehi, who attended the Munich Security Conference at the weekend where Biden made the offer, said in Berlin that it was still very difficult for Tehran and Washington - more than 30 years after they severed relations - to trust each other. “How do we trust again this new gesture?” Salehi said he hoped Barack Obama would keep what he said was a promise by the U.S. president to “walk away from wars… and approaches that bring destruction, killings, bloodshed”. He did not elaborate. “I think it is about time both sides really get into engagement because confrontation certainly is not the way,” Salehi said in Berlin, referring to the United States. “And another thing: this issue of the nuclear file is becoming boring,” added Salehi, a physicist by training who once headed the Iranian atomic energy agency and represented his country at the International Atomic Energy Agency. There is a dispute between Iran and the West over Tehran’s nuclear program. Western countries suspect Iran is seeking to develop nuclear weapons, while Tehran says the program is only meant for peaceful purposes. Negotiations between Iran and the six major powers - Russia, China, the United States, Britain, France, and Germany - over Tehran’s nuclear activities, which have been deadlocked since a meeting last June, is scheduled to be held in Kazakhstan on February 26.