West Sees Significant Gaps With Iran on Nuclear Deal

Efforts to open the way to a final nuclear deal between Iran and world powers appeared to fall short after a day of intensive talks between the Iranian foreign minister and his U.S. and European counterparts.

With a week left to a deadline for reaching a comprehensive deal, significant gaps remained, European foreign ministers said Sunday.

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif met U.S. and European foreign ministers in Vienna.

After the talks, European foreign ministers said while the discussions had been useful, Tehran must now choose whether it would take the steps needed for a deal.

"I think it has been good to have these meetings at ministerial level but there is no change in the state of play in these negotiations as of this moment," said U.K. Foreign Secretary William Hague.

Mr. Hague said there is still "a huge gap" in particular between Iran's demands for its future enrichment program and the position of Western governments that Tehran must scale back its activities.

The lack of a breakthrough would seem to significantly raise the odds that a final deal won't be done by July 20. The U.S. has said the talks would be extended beyond that point only if there is real progress to report.

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said he couldn't predict whether an accord would be reached on time. He said now was the moment for Iran to show that they were ready to take steps to reach a deal.

"It is now up to Iran to decide whether they follow the path toward international cooperation or whether they want to remain in isolation," he said.

Mr. Zarif met late Sunday with Secretary of State John Kerry, who warned on arrival in the Austrian capital of "very significant gaps" between the sides. "Obviously, we have some very significant gaps still. So we need to see if we can make some progress and I really look forward to a very substantive and important set of meetings and dialogues," Mr. Kerry told reporters as he arrived. "It is vital to make certain that Iran is not going to develop a nuclear weapon—that their program is peaceful."

After the meeting with Mr. Kerry, Mr. Zarif said the talks had made some important headway. "We tried to look into ways or means of bridging the gaps, narrowing the differences that we have—not necessarily by trying to meet halfway but…by trying to look into innovative ways of addressing the problems."

Mr. Zarif said Iran should have a serious nuclear program, but one that removes any concern and doubt about the peaceful nature.

Iran negotiates on its nuclear program with the U.S., the U.K., France, Russia, China and Germany.

The Russian and Chinese foreign ministers were unable to join the talks on Sunday.

Iran and the six powers are seeking to reach an agreement over the next week that would gradually lift international sanctions on Tehran in exchange for clear guarantees that Iran won't be able to quickly break out and produce nuclear weapons.

Speaking Saturday evening in Vienna, a senior U.S. official said any final agreement would need to ensure that Iran's future enrichment activities would be "very limited" for a number of years that can be measured in "double digits."

"For some period of time, they are going to have a very limited, very constrained program that will have inspections, verification, monitoring and a lot of limitations of what they can do," the official said.

Iranian officials have been pushing for a nuclear deal that would limit the country's program for only a few years.

However they continued to say it was Western governments that were failing to show flexibility. One diplomat accused the U.S. of sticking to "rigid" stances. By enriching uranium, Iran can produce enough nuclear fuel for an atomic bomb. Iran has insisted its nuclear program is purely for peaceful purposes.

Earlier in the week, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Iran will need a significantly greater enrichment program though he didn't say when.

Mr. Kerry may stay on in Vienna for further talks on Monday. One of the decisions the two sides will have to take is whether there has been enough progress on other issues aside from enrichment.

They include the future of some of Iran's nuclear facilities and the type and extent of monitoring Tehran will accept of its nuclear-related activities. They also include the timing of the lifting of sanctions and the duration of the agreement.

Both U.S. and Iranian officials say there has been some progress on narrowing gaps on some of these issues, but there is still much work to do.