European Union diplomatic sources Tuesday noted on the eve of the resumption of the EU-Iran negotiations for Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) on Wednesday that since Iran is a large regional political and economic power with a rapid growing population and a rapid growing economy, "obviously there are strong European economic interests."
The fifth round of TCA will be held after a pause of nearly one and a half years due to EU concerns about Iran's nuclear program. "We like to be there. We like to trade with them. We like to invest there as long as the market offers political, administrative and legal stability," EU sources told reporters on condition of anonymity.
Iran can contribute to the stability of a region with neighbors like Iraq, Afghanistan with problems such as drug trafficking, migration issues.
According to IRNA, the TCA will be a non-preferential Agreement focussed on economic and financial co-operation and on greater trade liberalization between the EU and Iran. "The first thing we will do (tomorrow) is to take stock of from where you left off to make sure that everybody around the table has the same recollection of how far we had gotten," said the sources. The decision to resume TCA negotiations follows the "Paris Agreement" between Iran and the United Kingdom, France and Germany, and the subsequent verification of the suspension of Iran's enrichment and reprocessing activities as confirmed by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) resolution of November 2004.
