On the principle that it is better to negotiate hopefully than to arrive prematurely at a dangerous impasse, Britain, France and Germany are relieved that President George Bush has now lent his support to their efforts to talk Iran out of its troubling nuclear technologies for enriching uranium and reprocessing plutonium. These would give Iran the capacity-though it denies the intent-to build a bomb. America's shift boosts the Europeans' negotiating power, so helping to keep tiieir struggling talks with Iran going, and closes a transatlantic rift that Iran had sought to exploit by playing injured party to a hostile America. It also returns the spotlight to where it ought to be, on Iran's egregious violations of nuclear safeguards. Yet for diplomacy to resolve the nuclear issue, America and Iran will both need to rethink their parts. And others, including Russia, China and Japan, have a role to play too.
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