Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif speaks to the media after a meeting of the foreign ministers representing the permanent five member countries of the United Nations Security Council, including Germany, at the U.N. Headquarters in New York September 26, 2013. PHOTO: REUTERS
NEW YORK CITY: World powers will meet again for talks with Iran on its suspect nuclear program on October 15 and 16 in Geneva after a breakthrough meeting Thursday, the EU's foreign policy chief said.
Foreign ministers who joined unprecedented talks at the United Nations had asked Tehran to respond to their proposals before next month's discussions, the EU's Catherine Ashton told reporters after the meeting.
"It was a substantial meeting, good atmosphere, energetic. We had a discussion about how we would forward with an ambitious timeframe to see if we could make progress quickly," Ashton said, praising new Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif for talking so "openly."
"We have agreed to meet in Geneva on the 15 and 16 of October to pursue the agenda, to carry on from today's meeting and to hopefully move this process forward," Ashton said.
The talks in New York, at which Zarif sat down at the table with US Secretary of State John Kerry in one of the highest level meetings since the 1979 Revolution, appear to have given fresh impetus to the decade-old effort to rein in Iran's nuclear activities.
"The tone and spirit of the meeting we've had has been very good, and indeed a big improvement on the tone and spirit of previous meetings on this issue and I pay tribute to minister Zarif for that," British Foreign Secretary William Hague said.
"We've all established good working relations with him during this week in New York and this meeting was a reflection of that. We have all talked about the importance of reaching a peaceful and negotiated solution on this issue, and our commitment to seek to do that."
Global powers accuse Iran of seeking to obtain a nuclear bomb, under the guise of what Tehran insists is its civilian nuclear energy program.
Zarif, who was put in charge of the nuclear dossier by new Iranian President Hassan Rouhani when he took office in August, has already called for an agreement within three to six months.
Ashton said that like Zarif she was "very ambitious about what we can do, but we have to be practical about translating that ambition into what does that mean for the effective work we do on the ground."
COMMENTS
Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
For more information, please see our Comments FAQ