REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, LAUSANNE -- Russia and Iran's foreign ministers claimed in the early hours of Wednesday a breakthrough in talks on a framework deal curtailing Tehran's nuclear programme, but the US said not all issues had been agreed.
"One can say with relative certainty that we at the minister level have reached an agreement in principle on all key aspects of the final settlement of this issue," Russian media quoted Sergei Lavrov as saying at talks in Switzerland.
This came after Russia's top diplomat and the foreign ministers of five other major powers and Iran missed a midnight (2200 GMT) deadline to agree the main outlines of what they hope will be an historic accord but continued working through the night.
The powers hope this final agreement, due to be finalised by June 30, will see Iran scale down its nuclear programme in order to prevent Tehran developing nuclear weapons under the guise of its civilian programme.
The stakes are high, with fears that failure to reach a deal may set the United States and Israel on a road to military action to thwart Iran's nuclear drive, which Tehran says is purely peaceful.
The "agreement in principle... will be put on paper in the coming hours or perhaps within one day," Lavrov said, quoted by Ria Novosti after a lengthy day of talks in Lausanne.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said he hoped to complete later on Wednesday the framework nuclear agreement, allowing the process of drafting a final accord by the June 30 deadline to begin.
"We have accomplished quite a bit but people needed to get some rest and start over early in the morning. I hope that we can finalise the work on Wednesday and hopefully start the process of drafting (a final accord)", Zarif told reporters.
A senior US official however said there was not yet full agreement on key points of the framework accord.
"All issues have not been agreed," a senior US official told AFP.
A Western diplomat said there was no framework agreement yet while a spokeswoman for the European Union, which is chairing the talks, said only that the ministerial meeting was over.
"Talks still ongoing with Political Directors to reconvene early (Wednesday)," Catherine Rey, the spokeswoman, said on Twitter.
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius meanwhile followed his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in leaving the negotiations, with Fabius's office saying he would return "as soon as it is useful".
US Secretary of State John Kerry, who arrived in Lausanne last Wednesday, remained however together with British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, Germany's Frank-Walter Steinmeier and EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini.
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