President Hassan Rouhani told a German newspaper on Monday in an interview to attempt broaching an issue he has so far avoided since he took office.
"We want to rebuild and improve our relations to European and North American countries on a basis of mutual respect," he wrote in a contribution for the Sueddeutsche Zeitung newspaper.
"We are striving to avoid new burdens on relations between Iran and the United States and also to remove the tensions that we have inherited," said Rouhani, who has promised to reduce Tehran's isolation and to win an easing of sanctions.
Tehran and Washington severed relations after Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution.
Iran cannot forget everything that has affected relations with the United States over the last 60 years, he said, but added: "We must now concentrate on the present and orientate ourselves towards the future."
Rouhani, a former nuclear negotiator, said he was doing whatever he could to end tensions over Tehran's nuclear activities, which have raised concerns in the West that Iran is seeking to develop an atomic weapons capability. Iranian officials have repeatedly denied such suggestions.
"We have never even considered the option of acquiring nuclear weapons," Rouhani said. "We'll never give up our right to profit from nuclear energy. But we are working towards removing all doubts and answer all reasonable questions about our program."
Source: Reuters
MNA
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