The foreign ministers of the United States and Iran are to hold their first talks on the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program, in what is considered as a diplomatic breakthrough.

The foreign ministers of the United States and Iran are to hold their first talks on the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program, in what is considered as a diplomatic breakthrough.

Secretary of State John Kerry and new Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif will join counterparts from Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia at the meeting at United Nations headquarters, US officials said Monday.

The talks "will give our ministers a sense of their level of seriousness and whether they are coming with concrete new proposals and whether this charm offensive actually has substance to it," a senior US State Department official said.

The US-educated Zarif, whose knowledge of Western culture has endeared him to foreign diplomats, confirmed Thursday's meeting on his Facebook page.

Zarif said he spoke to EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton of Iran's "political will as well as a conceptual framework to reach a solution that would ensure the Iranian people's rights and would lift the sanctions."
"It is evident from her post-meeting interview that she took it positively," Zarif commented on the social media site.

Ashton, who has led Western efforts to engage with Tehran, said she was "struck by the energy and determination" of Zarif.
But "as you would appreciate, there is a huge amount of work to do," she added.

High-level contacts between Iranian and US officials have been rare since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

But in another sign of a possible thaw, the White House said it was not ruling out a meeting between President Barack Obama and new Iranian counterpart Sheikh Hasan Rouhani on the sidelines of this week's UN General Assembly.