DHAKA: Iranian foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif is scheduled to meet with foreign ministers of the six major powers, including US state secretary John Kerry, on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York on Thursday.

The agreement was made during a meeting in New York on Monday between Zarif and European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton who leads diplomatic efforts to resolve the decade-old nuclear dispute on behalf of the six major powers, namely the United States, China, Russia, Britain, France, and Germany, which are known as the 5+1 group.

US sources confirmed that Kerry will be in the meeting.

Ashton told reporters after the meeting that she saw ‘energy and determination’ for talks with the major powers.

Ashton also said she and her team will meet with Zarif again in October to follow up on Thursday’s meeting to continue their discussion on reviving long-stalled negotiations, the NBC reported on its website.

‘We had a good and constructive discussion,’ she said of her half-hour meeting with Zarif, reports Tehran Times.

‘We didn’t talk about the details of what we would do. The purpose of this meeting was to establish how we would go forward.’

BDST: 1729 HRS, SEPT 24, 2013
RoR/RK