UNITED NATIONS, (PNA/Itar-Tass) — A meeting of the foreign ministers of the six key nations – permanent members of the UN Security Council (Russia, Britain, China, the USA, France) and Germany with Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs Mohammad Javad Zarif was held at the United Nations’ headquarters on Thursday.
A number of the meeting participants expressed cautious optimism about the possibility of resolving the Iranian nuclear issue.
The key point of the meeting was setting a new date for the negotiations, which will take place in Geneva on 15-16 October.
The parties have agreed to meet in Geneva on 15 and 16 October, EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Catherine Ashton told reporters.
“We had a discussion about how we would go forward with an ambitious timeframe to see whether we can make progress quickly,” she stated.
Ashton said the Geneva meeting on Oct 15-16 would “carry on from today’s meeting and hopefully move this process forward.”
“We want to spend our time in Geneva translating that into the practical details,” said Ashton, adding: “I am very ambitious for what we can do, but we all know we have to be very practical.”
The diplomat said the meeting was substantial and noted that it was held in a good atmosphere.
A set of proposals on (mutual) confidence building measures was put forward, she said.
According to her, Iranian government should react to them or present its own proposal.
Zarif for his part insisted that the main result of the negotiations with the six should be the full lifting of sanctions currently in place against Iran.
“We believe that sanctions are counterproductive and inconsistent with international law,” he stressed. According to him, all international sanctions, including those in effect under a UN resolution must be lifted in the end.
“We hope to be able to make progress towards resolving this issue in a timely fashion, based on respecting the rights of the Iranian people to nuclear technology for peaceful purposes, including enrichment, and at the same time making sure that there is no concern at the international level that Iran’s nuclear program is anything but peaceful,” said Zarif.