BRASILIA (AFP) -- The United States and Brazil on Monday talked over foreign policy differences on Iran, Honduras and U.S. use of Colombian military bases during a visit by a senior U.S. diplomat.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Arturo Valenzuela, who is in charge of Western hemisphere affairs, sat down with Brazil's presidential foreign affairs advisor, Marco Aurelio Garcia, to clear the air, the latter said.
Garcia said he explained to Valenzuela that Brazil's dialogue with Iran and its recent hosting of a visit by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were because Brasilia believed Tehran had a “positive role to play” in the search for peace in the Middle East.
He also reiterated that Brazil backed Iran's nuclear energy program as long as it abided by International Atomic Energy Agency norms and was purely for civilian energy production.
On Honduras, where the United States has recognized elections held by a de facto government that forced out President Manuel Zelaya in June while Brazil refuses to do so, Garcia said he and Valenzuela found two points in common.
Both Brazil and the United States agreed that a solution required de facto president Roberto Micheletti to step down, and for Zelaya to be given safe passage out of the Brazilian embassy in Honduras, where he has been holed up since September.
The two governments would establish a “consulting mechanism” to air their differences over the Central American nation, Garcia said.
Finally, the two officials discussed the U.S. use of seven military bases in Colombia, a development that has angered several South American nations wary of any U.S. military manifestation, given Washington's past operations in the region.
Garcia told Valenzuela the base issue “is not a positive factor in the region,” and he urged the U.S. government to talk the matter over directly with the ruffled countries.
Valenzuela, for his part, gave away nothing of how he viewed the meeting.
“What impresses me is how much we are in agreement on basic fundamentals in our relationship,” he said. He did not elaborate.
After Brazil, the U.S. diplomat was to visit Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay.