Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs William J. Burns, the third-ranking State Department official, will attend a meeting on Saturday with the European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana and Iran's nuclear negotiator, Saeed Jalili, the New York Times said quoting an unidentified senior administration official.
After months of accusations and counter-accusations from the US and Iran, the meeting raised the prospect of an intensified diplomatic push to resolve concerns over Iranian nuclear activity, not unlike sthe lengthy and painstaking talks that resulted in a deal last month with North Korea, the daily said.
The decision appeared to bend, if not exactly break, the administration's insistence that it would not negotiate with Iran over its nuclear programmes unless it first suspended uranium enrichment, as demanded by three resolutions of the UN Security Council, the Times said.
At the meeting, Jalili is expected to present Iran's formal response to a package of economic and diplomatic incentives that Germany and the Security Council's five permanent members, Russia, China, France, Britain and the United States, presented Iran in June. Representatives from those countries will also attend the meeting.
The United States, the Times noted, did not have a representative at the June meeting.