This particular issue is relatively straightforward, and the negotiations will likely result in the Fardo facility being placed under the IAEA's regular regime of inspections, already firmly in place with respect to Iran's other nuclear facilities. But it is nonetheless tied in with the more complicated issue of Iran's request for assistance with its medical research reactor in Tehran, which will run out of nuclear fuel by the end of 2010. The request was initially floated by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad during his recent tour of the United Nations in New York.

Concerning the latter, the U.S., Russia and France, in coordination with the IAEA, have been secretly developing a plan for the delivery of high-enriched uranium (HEU) to the Tehran reactor for several months. Under the plan, which was broached at the last meeting with Iranian negotiators on Oct. 2, Iran would ship its stockpiles of low-enriched uranium to Russia for further refinement -- from 4 percent to the 20 percent required by the Tehran reactor -- with subsequent conversion to nuclear fuel cells taking place in France. The timetable and modality of the transaction, which has yet to be agreed upon, would be under the full aegis of IAEA.

But despite Russia and France's declared willingness to proceed with this plan, it has been hotly debated in the U.S., with some hawkish pundits, such as John Bolton, opposing it on the grounds that, a) it puts a seal of approval on Iran's enrichment program, which is the subject of several U.N. Security Council resolutions; and (b) it actually raises the risk of Iranian proliferation.

The problems with Bolton's objections are three-fold.

First, the fact that the issue arises at all serves as a reminder of Iran's non-diversion of its stockpile of HEU already at the Tehran reactor, as verified by repeated IAEA inspections. Any new delivery of nuclear fuel to Iran will likewise be under the IAEA's rigorous surveillance.

Second, Bolton and other critics of the Obama administration's engagement policy toward Iran miss the point that Iran has already mastered the nuclear fuel cycle. In the event that Iran's demand for outside assistance for the Tehran reactor is turned down or subjected to a lengthy delay, Iran will have no recourse but to undertake the financial and technological challenge of producing the nuclear material itself -- a comparatively more anxiety-causing scenario as far as the West is concerned. Not only that, should the West renege on its NPT obligation to assist Iran's medical reactor -- which is critical to the nation's medical needs, including cancer treatment -- Iran may retaliate by decreasing, instead of increasing, its cooperation with the IAEA. That explains the linkage between the two main subjects of multilateral discussions in Vienna on Oct. 19.

Third, Bolton conveniently glosses over a key advantage of the plan to ship out a portion of Iran's LEU -- namely, that it reduces the quantity of Iran's stockpile that could theoretically be diverted to proliferation purposes.

Bolton's objections also ignore the protean value of confidence-building generated as a result of a successful good-faith negotiation, which could potentially culminate in a new multilateralization of nuclear cooperation with Iran. Russia is currently Iran's sole nuclear partner. The proposed multilateral enrichment plan actually opens a new vista for the entry of other players to the Iranian "nuclear market."

That conceivably includes the U.S., which built the Tehran reactor prior to the 1979 Islamic Revolution, but afterwards reneged on its contractual obligation to deliver the nuclear fuel for it. That prompted Tehran to seek alternative suppliers, chiefly Argentina. (Argentina's nuclear cooperation with Iran -- which entailed plans to train Iranian scientists, as well as the construction of a uranium dioxide conversion plant and a fuel fabrication facility for Iran -- came to an abrupt halt as a direct result of the July 1994 bombing of a Jewish center in Buenos Aires.)

For all the United States' talk of "success" or "failure" in Iran nuclear talks, a multilateral -- and robust -- agreement for the delivery of HEU for the Tehran reactor clearly constitutes a specific benchmark that in all likelihood will have positive ripple effects on the broader, macro issues of concern regarding Iran's nuclear program. It will boost Tehran's flexibility, enhance its mood for cooperation with the IAEA, and even increase the IAEA's chance of persuading Tehran to re-adopt the intrusive Additional Protocol.

Iran implemented such an agreement without ratifying it in 2003 and abided by it for two years. Tehran suspended the Additional Protocol after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's 2005 election victory, arguing at the time that the West had not lived up to its part of the deal by "normalizing" Iran's nuclear file, as stipulated in the 2007 Iran-IAEA Workplan. The six "outstanding issues" in that document were successfully resolved in Iran's favor according to the IAEA's February 2008 report.

The upcoming meeting represents an exceptional opportunity to achieve a timely breakthrough in the Iran nuclear stalemate. By adopting a sequential approach focused on establishing progressive stages of confidence-building, the West has the best chance of de-escalating and hopefully resolving this potentially dangerous crisis, instead of exacerbating it through a one-dimensional, coercive diplomacy.

**Kaveh Afrasiabi has taught political science at Tehran University and was a researcher at two Tehran think tanks, Institute For Political and International Studies and Center for Strategic Research. He is the author of several books on Iran's foreign and nuclear policies. His latest book, co-edited with Iran's former Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Maleki, is entitled "Reading in Iran's Foreign Policy After September 11."