TEHRAN – Iran has invited the UN nuclear watchdog to visit for talks, a senior Western diplomat said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. 

The envoy said the invitation included no promise that talks would cover issues raised last month in an International Atomic Energy Agency released on November 8, in which it claimed that Iran appears to have worked on designing an atomic bomb. 

"Apparently the Iranians have invited agency officials," the diplomat said. 

A second Vienna-based diplomat was unable to confirm that Iran had issued an invitation, but said the IAEA and Tehran had been in contact about a possible visit which could take place early next year. If agreed, this could be "good news," he added.

There was no immediate comment from the IAEA, the Iranian mission in Vienna, or Iranian officials in Tehran.

The IAEA carries out regular inspections of Iranian nuclear sites but has not sent a senior official for talks since August, before it released its latest report. 

The director of Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, Fereydoun Abbasi, wrote to the IAEA in late October suggesting that a senior delegation headed by IAEA Deputy Director General Herman Nackaerts, head of the agency's safeguards inspections worldwide, should visit for talks.

IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano said in November he had proposed sending a high-level team to Iran to "clarify the issues" raised in the report.

Another Vienna-based Western diplomat said Amano would probably only agree to send his officials to Tehran in order to specifically discuss such issues.

The main bone of contention between Tehran and the West is Iran’s uranium enrichment program. 

Iran says all its nuclear activities are totally peaceful, and, as an International Atomic Energy Agency member and a nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty signatory, it has the legal right to produce nuclear fuel for its research reactors and nuclear power plants.