RIYADH
EU foreign policy chief Catherin Ashton arrived in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday as part of a Gulf tour that already took her to Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.
Ashton met with Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Nizar bin Obaid Madani for talks on bilateral relations and issues of mutual concern.
The top EU diplomat is scheduled to visit Oman and Qatar as part of her current tour in the Gulf region.
On Monday, Ashton said that she plans to visit Iran within weeks.
"I read with interest the invitation to visit Tehran and it is my intention to do so in the course of the next weeks," she told a joint press conference with Kuwait's Foreign Minister Sheikh Sabah Khaled Al-Sabah.
In November, Iran and the six world powers -- US, Britain, Russia, France, China and Germany – recently penned a deal freeze Tehran's nuclear program in exchange for limited sanctions relief to secure that its nuclear power could be used only for peaceful purposes.
The agreement requires Iran to halt or scale back parts of its nuclear infrastructure, the first such pause in more than a decade, foreseeing an initial six-month period that brings boundaries to Tehran’s nuclear program.
Tehran’s next-generation centrifuges and the Arak reactor, which could begin to produce plutonium as early as 2014, would also be halted.
The International Atomic Energy Agency would have daily access to the Natanz and Fordow nuclear facilities, and would allow more frequent access to the Arak reactor.
In exchange, Tehran would receive limited sanctions relief, which would add roughly $1.5 billion in revenue from suspended sanctions "on gold and precious metals, Iran's auto sector, and Iran's petrochemical exports."
An additional $4.2 billion would be transferred to Iran in installments from Iranian oil sales.
By Ahmed al-Masri
englishnews@aa.com.tr
