Zarif, who is leading Iran’s negotiating team, made the remarks after arriving in the Austrian capital, Vienna on Monday for the next round of high-level talks with the P5+1 group over Tehran’s nuclear energy program.

He also said a recent anti-Iran human rights resolution by European Parliament will not have any effect on the talks between Iran and the P5+1 group—the US, France, Britain, Russia and China plus Germany.

“We believe that the opinions of the European Parliament have no credit and political weight and will have no effect on nuclear talks,” he said.

Zarif also met EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who is leading the team from the six world powers.

The heads of the negotiating teams are to review reports of the expert delegations from both sides, which wrapped up their latest round of talks in Vienna on Saturday and discuss the agenda for the two-day high-level negotiations set for today.

On Saturday, Hamid Baeidinejad, the head of Iran’s negotiating team involved in expert-level talks, described the latest round as ‘useful’.

The talks between Tehran and the six countries are part of efforts to seal a final deal on Iran’s nuclear energy program. The two sides reached an interim deal on November 24, 2013 in the Swiss city of Geneva to set the stage for the full settlement of the dispute. The deal went into effect on January 20.

Under the Geneva deal, the six countries agreed to provide Iran with some sanctions relief in exchange for Iran agreeing to limit certain aspects of its nuclear activities during a six-month period. It was also agreed that no nuclear-related sanctions would be imposed on the Islamic Republic within the same time frame.

BA/BA