Russian President Vladimir Putin and Pope Francis have discussed the need for talks to resolve the Syria conflict, as international officials set a date for a peace conference.
The two leaders talked about the urgent need "to promote concrete initiatives for a peaceful solution to the conflict, favouring negotiation", the Vatican said in a statement, following a 35-minute audience in the Apostolic Palace.
The pair agreed any solution should involve "the various ethnic and religious groups, recognising their essential role in society".
The Kremlin chief and the head of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics also discussed "the urgency of the need to bring an end to the violence and to ensure necessary humanitarian assistance for the population".
Pope Francis has been a powerful voice against an armed international intervention in the Syria conflict, and has voiced concern about the plight of Christian minorities there and in other parts of the Middle East.
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UN and Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi on Monday met US and Russian officials, to set a January 22 start date for a peace conference on the conflict in Syria in Geneva.
Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said that Putin had also brought greetings for Pope Francis from Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill, but had not invited the pope to Moscow - an elusive diplomatic breakthrough.
Francis has put particular emphasis on improving relations with the Orthodox world ever since being elected in March, and Patriarch of Constantinople Bartholomew I, the spiritual leader of the world's Orthodox, was present at his inauguration.
Once strained ties between the Catholic and Russian Orthodox churches have improved greatly in recent years and the head of the Russian church's external relations department said an historic meeting between the pope and the patriarch was now "more and more realistic".
