Chinese FM arrives in Geneva for Iran nuclear talks

GENEVA - Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi arrived in Geneva at noon on Saturday to join the ongoing international talks on the Iranian nuclear issue.

Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesman Hong Lei said Saturday the talks between Iran and 5+1 nations, namely China, the United States, Russia, Britain, France and Germany, have reached the final moment.

Prior to Wang's arrival, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and US Secretary of State John Kerry had arrived in the Swiss city. They will be joined by British Foreign Secretary William Hague, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius and German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle for talks with Iran.

The new round of talks starting from Wednesday is the third negotiations between Iran and the six countries in more than a month.

The last round of intensive talks, held from Nov 7 to 9, failed to nail down an interim deal as expected, but it was announced that a lot of concrete progress had been achieved while some differences remained.

A senior US official said on condition of anonymity Wednesday evening that the focus of this round of talks is to get into details of "a possible first-step agreement, and the parameters of a comprehensive agreement and to see if we can narrow the remaining gaps necessary to conclude such an agreement."

Western countries have long been accusing Iran of developing nuclear weapons under the cover of a civilian nuclear program, but Iran insists that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.

Under the potential preliminary agreement, Iran would curb its nuclear program in exchange for modest sanction relief. The agreement, if successfully inked, would break up the decade-long deadlock over Tehran's disputed nuclear program.