MOSCOW -- President Vladimir Putin hailed the close ties between the Russian and Turkish militaries on Friday as he hosted Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan for talks about Syria.
Russia and Turkey co-brokered a cease-fire in December that helped reduce the scale of fighting between Syrian President Bashar Assad and the opposition. They also co-sponsored two rounds of talks this year between Assad's government and its foes. A third round is set for next week.
Russia and Turkey also coordinated their operations against the Islamic State extremist group in Syria. A Russian air raid last month accidentally killed three Turkish soldiers, but the incident didn't derail the military coordination.
After concluding his meeting with Erdogan at the Kremlin, Putin hailed "efficient and close contact" between their militaries and intelligence agencies around Syria.
He said it was mostly "Russia and Turkey that have made a major contribution not only to securing a cease-fire between Syrian government forces and the armed opposition, but also to launching direct, concrete talks" between them.
Earlier this week, the chief military officers from Russia, the United States and Turkey met in the Turkish city of Antalya in an apparent attempt to work out additional steps to prevent future accidental deaths involving one another's troops.
The talks also focused on how to help assuage mutual mistrust between Turkish-backed Syrian opposition forces, U.S.-backed Kurdish forces, and Russian-allied Syrian government forces all fighting their way toward the Islamic State group's de facto capital, Raqqa.
Putin briefed top intelligence and military officials from his Security Council after Friday's meeting with Erdogan.
Asked by a reporter whether Russia and Turkey shared the idea that Syria and Iraq should be preserved within current borders, Putin spoke of "the complex situation" and "contradictions" in the Syria peace talks.
But he insisted that preserving Syria's territorial integrity is a "necessary condition for the full-scale peace settlement in this country." Erdogan echoed the comments, saying that maintaining Syria's current borders was Turkey's "main goal."
The cooperation on Syria between Russia and Turkey marked a sharp turnaround for the two nations, which have backed opposing sides in Syria, with Russia siding with Assad and Turkey supporting his foes since the start of the Syrian conflict six years ago.
Relations reached a low point in November 2015 when Turkey shot down a Russian warplane that it said had crossed into Turkey.
Information for this article was contributed by Nataliya Vasilyeva of The Associated Press.
A Section on 03/11/2017