Iran on Sunday issued a warning against Western nations ahead of the upcoming P5+1 negotiations over its contentious nuclear program, and called for an end to the "Zionists´ pressures," FARS news agency reported.

Representatives from Iran and the P5+1 group of world powers held talks on Iran´s controversial nuclear program in Istanbul on April 14 and are scheduled to meet again on Wednesday in Baghdad.

In a statement released Sunday, the Iranian parliament called on the West "to give up their strategy of deceit and dual-track" policy.

"We warn the Group 5+1 (sic) to respect the rights of the Iranian nation, act on the basis of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which is an internationally accepted norm and free from the Zionists´ pressures and change the policy of confrontation with the Islamic Republic to a policy of interaction," FARS quoted Iran´s parliament as saying.

Western diplomats said last week that Iran is installing more centrifuges in an underground plant but does not yet appear to be using them to expand higher-grade uranium enrichment that could take it closer to producing atom bomb material.

They say Iran´s production of uranium refined to a fissile concentration of 20 percent, which it started two years ago, seems to have remained steady in recent months after a major escalation of the work in late 2011 and early this year.

Getting Iran to stop the higher-level enrichment is expected to be a priority for world powers when they meet with Iran in Baghdad.

Nuclear bombs require uranium enriched to 90 percent, but much of the effort required to get there is already achieved once it reaches 20 percent concentration, shortening the time needed for any nuclear weapons "break-out."

Tehran denies Western accusations of a nuclear weapons agenda and says it has a sovereign right to peaceful nuclear technology, repeatedly rejecting UN resolutions calling for a suspension of all uranium enrichment.

But it has at times appeared more flexible when it comes to the refinement to a fissile concentration of 20 percent, which it says it needs to fuel a medical research reactor in Tehran.

Experts say that initially getting Iran to stop this work could open a way to ease the deadlock.

Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon on Sunday stated that Iran would choose survival over nuclear capability, but urged negotiation Western powers to be wary of Iranian deception.

Speaking at a conference sponsored by Motorola, Ya´alon said that the Iranians are trying manipulate- to negotiate while proceeding with its nuclear program, adding that he hopes the negotiating powers would not fall for Iran´s strategy.

The European Union has stated that it will impose tougher sanctions on Iran if it fails to take concrete steps to allay international concerns over its nuclear program. Tehran is facing a raft of intensified international sanctions, including an EU ban on its crude oil exports, which is due to take full effect on July 1.

The UN nuclear chief Director General Yukiya Amano was set to fly to Tehran on Sunday in an apparent bid to secure a deal enabling his inspectors to probe suspicions of atomic bomb research. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief scheduled a meeting for Monday on short notice, prompting diplomats to comment that an agreement on new inspections may be near.

The IAEA wants Iran to clarify issues raised by an agency report last year that revealed intelligence pointing to past and possibly ongoing activity in the country of use in developing the means and technologies needed to build nuclear bombs. (© 1995-2011, The Jerusalem Post 05/20/12)