WASHINGTON: The United States and Russia renewed high-level contacts between their militaries on Friday to discuss how to deal with the war in Syria.
US Secretary of Defense Ash Carter and Russia's Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu spoke by telephone, spokesmen from their ministries said.
Washington and its NATO allies broke off ties with the Russian military in April last year in protest at Moscow's intervention in Ukraine.
But now the rivals find themselves enmeshed in Syria, where they face an opportunity to work together but also the danger of an accidental clash.
For a year, the United States and a coalition of Western and Arab allies have been carrying out air strikes against Islamic State jihadists.
The United States has also, with limited success, been training Syrians who are fighting the extremist IS group but who are also in revolt against the Damascus regime.
Russia, meanwhile, is providing support to Bashar al-Assad's government and building up its own military presence at an airbase and a naval depot in western Syria.
"The secretary and the minister talked about areas where the United States and Russia's perspectives overlap and areas of divergence," Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said.
Russian defense ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov told Russian agencies that the call had lasted an hour and that contacts would continue.
"The necessity to coordinate bilateral and multilateral efforts to combat international terrorism was at the center of attention," he said.
"The conversation showed that the two points of view are similar or the same on most of the issues discussed."
In Washington, Cook said: "They agreed to further discuss mechanisms for deconfliction in Syria and the counter-ISIL campaign."
AFP
