GENEVA: A US envoy held one-on-one talks with Iran's top nuclear negotiator for the first time yesterday during a meeting with five other world powers hoping to convince Teheran to freeze its atomic drive.

Iran's top nuclear negotiator met officials from the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany in a villa overlooking Lake Geneva only a week after a new secret Iranian uranium enrichment plant was disclosed.

The US envoy at the talks, William Burns, also met separately with Iranian negotiator Saeed Jalili, in a rare official encounter between the two nations, a US spokesman said.