Sergei Lavrov and Hillary Clinton have discussed the preparation of the new treaty on strategic arms reduction, a Russian Foreign Ministry source said on Saturday.

In the telephone talk on March 4, Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State Clinton discussed bilateral strategic dialogue issues related to the work on the new treaty on strategic offensive arms reduction. They also discussed issues of priority attention to complete the work on the treaty.

Lavrov and Clinton exchanged views on the course of preparation for the ministerial meeting of the Quartet of international Middle East settlement mediators in Moscow on March 19.

They also discussed the situation over the Iranian nuclear programme, the ministry source added.