ANKARA, Turkey — Iran’s top nuclear negotiator said yesterday that talks with a senior EU official had brought them closer to “a united view” of how to break a deadlock over Tehran’s defiance of a UN Security Council demand to freeze uranium enrichment.The upbeat comments by Ali Larijani boosted hopes that he and Javier Solana, the European Union’s top foreign policy official, had chipped away at differences over enrichment — a potential pathway to nuclear arms — in two days of talks.

“In some areas we are approaching a united view,” Larijani told reporters after a breakfast meeting with Solana and Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul. “We are aiming to reach out for a common paradigm.”

Solana spoke of a “good meeting,” adding: “We cannot make miracles, but we tried to move ... the (nuclear) dossier forward.”

“The fact that we are together again is itself a very important development,” he said. The two men’s last meeting, in September, collapsed over the enrichment issue.

Neither man revealed details of their talks. But a government official based in a European capital who was briefed on the outcome of the meeting said a new definition of an enrichment freeze acceptable to both sides was “the key issue.”

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he spoke to Solana on Wednesday about his meeting with Larijani.

“I strongly encouraged again Iranians and ... the international community, led by European Union, should resolve this issue as soon as possible,” Ban told reporters at UN headquarters in New York yesterday.

“At the same time, I would like to strongly urge again Iranian authorities to fully comply with the Security Council resolution and engage in dialogue with international community for peaceful resolution of this issue as soon as possible,” the secretary-general said.

Solana said “specific discussions” did not revolve around a new definition of enrichment but said progress was made “in general terms.”

In an interview with CNN-Turk television, Larijani said “new ideas” had emerged.

“I can’t give exact details because these ideas need more time to be developed. But I can call them a very positive, concrete first step,” he said. Larijani also said another meeting on the nuclear issue would be held in two weeks, but he did not specify the location.

There was also mention of a “double time out” — a freeze of enrichment activities in exchange for a commitment not to impose new UN sanctions, said the official who demanded anonymity in exchange for discussing the confidential information with The Associated Press.

The “double time out” concept is supported by International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei and is part of a confidential document shared on Wednesday with the AP.

The one-page document, based on a Swiss initiative, proposes that “Iran will not develop any further its enrichment activities” while the six powers negotiating with Iran “will not table any additional UN resolutions and sanctions.”

Diplomats said the document is opposed by the United States, Britain and France but that parts of it could nonetheless serve as the basis of a later agreement that could lead to formal negotiations.

Solana was meeting with Larijani on behalf of the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany, the countries at the forefront of international efforts to pressure Iran to make nuclear concessions.

Government officials outside Turkey had told the AP ahead of the meeting that the six powers may ultimately be willing to allow Iran to keep some of its uranium enrichment program intact.

That would be a major development. The United States in particular publicly continues to insist that Iran must suspend all enrichment and related activities.

The Ankara meetings are only preliminary discussions meant to establish if there is enough common ground for further talks between the two men that could lead to the resumption of formal nuclear negotiations between the six powers and Iran.

Iran’s defiance of the UN Security Council demands on enrichment has led to two sets of sanctions against the country.

Iran argues the sanctions are illegal, noting it has the right to enrich uranium to generate nuclear power under the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty. Iranian officials say nuclear power is the only purpose of their program, dismissing suspicions that they ultimately want weapons-grade uranium for the fissile core of nuclear warheads.

But the United States and others say past suspicious nuclear activities, including a program Iran kept secret for nearly two decades, set the country apart from others that have endorsed the treaty.

Solana was expected to brief US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice next week during an EU-US summit in Washington, as well as the foreign ministers of the other five major powers. They in turn were likely to set ground rules for the next meeting between Larijani and Solana.

Iran is running more than 1,300 centrifuge machines at its underground facility at Natanz. Ultimately, it wants to operate 50,000 centrifuges, enough to churn out material for a network of nuclear power generators — or a full-scale nuclear weapons programme.