Iran nuclear talks set to resume on November 7 European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton (left) laughs with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif. Geneva: After the most ""intense, detailed, straightforward and candid"" talks with Iran in many years, US officials voiced cautious hope on Wednesday that a peaceful resolution will be found to the long-running dispute over its nuclear program. US negotiators declined to use the word ""breakthrough"" to describe the two days of meetings in Geneva between top Iranian officials and representatives of the United States and its negotiating partners, Russia, China, Germany, Britain and France. But the six world powers announced in a ""unprecedented"" joint statement with Iran that talks will resume in Geneva on November 7. In the intervening weeks, technical experts will meet to explore the details of a new proposal from Iran, which is seeking relief from tough sanctions in exchange for a verifiable commitment not to build a nuclear weapon. Catherine Ashton, the European Union's chief diplomat, said the talks were ""very intensive"" and ""very important"." She said both sides had had the opportunity to talk in ""much greater detail than ever before, to answer each other's questions"." The head of the US delegation, Undersecretary of State Wendy Sherman, didn't comment for the record, but a senior official summed up the US reaction in unusually hopeful terms. ""We are beginning that kind of negotiation to get to a place where, in fact, one can imagine that you could possibly have an agreement,"" the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. In Washington, the White House said the Iranian proposal contained a ""level of seriousness and substance that we have not seen before"." Iranian officials delivered a slightly more ambiguous message. Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, speaking in English, said the talks showed that ""both sides are serious about finding"" a peaceful resolution. Switching to Farsi, he said Iran ""was insisting on our rights in the context of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty"," wording that's usually taken to mean that Iran would insist on continuing to enrich uranium. Baroness Ashton said it was the first time that Iran and the six major powers had issued a joint statement, but it was in fact the second in 18 months, the last coming after talks in Istanbul in April 2012. That meeting led to a round of talks in Baghdad, Moscow and Almaty, Kazakhstan, that then sputtered to a halt. What's different this time is that Iran has a new government led by Hassan Rouhani. Mr Zarif conducted the entire two-day discussion in English. ""The pace of the discussions is much better, and it creates the ability to have a back-and-forth one must have if you want to have a negotiation,"" the senior US official said. Mr Zarif, who arrived in Geneva complaining of acute back pain, was seated in a wheelchair and had to be helped to the podium to speak. ""There isn't one among us who doesn't have a back problem"" as a result of extensive travel in cramped airline seats, the senior US official said. ""Everybody had a back story for him, books he should read, things he might try."" Mr Zarif's solution on Wednesday was treatment by an acupuncturist. But there was no sign that it was working. McClatchy