Iran and world powers sit down for two days of talks on Friday in the hopes of putting an end to a decade-old nuclear dispute that has left the Islamic republic enduring UN sanctions and risking military action from its arch foe Israel.
At stake in the Kazakh mountain city of Almaty will be whether Iran is ready to accept a series of watered-down demands that the powers presented at the last such negotiations at the same venue in February.
Failure could prove costly to both sides. A possible war would likely see a global spike in oil prices - putting a tenuous economic recovery in further peril - and draw in other regional powers at an already unstable time in the Middle East.
But progress at these talks has been fleeting and neither side realistically expects a breakthrough by the time the two-day meeting winds down on Saturday.
Chief Iranian negotiator Saeed Jalili told the six world powers - comprised of the five permanent UN Security Council members and Germany and known collectively as the P5+1 - that Iran demanded an immediate recognition of his country’s right to enrich uranium.