Russian President Vladimir Putin has met with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Azerbaijani capital of Baku for high-level talks reportedly focusing on energy issues as well as the Syrian crisis.

The Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Pskov said ahead of the Saturday talks that he expected the discussions to be "very substantive," adding that the leaders would discuss the TurkStream pipeline to supply Russian gas to Turkey, whose construction is set to commence by the end of the current month, Russian media outlets reported.

He was further cited as saying that Putin and Erdogan also intended to discuss the persisting crisis in Syria, Turkey’s southern neighbor.  

"They will need to compare notes and exchange opinions on the complex situation in regional affairs -- that's the situation in Syria, for sure," Pskov was quoted as saying in the reports.

Joining Putin in the talks with the Turkish delegation were Presidential aide Yuri Ushakov, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Energy Minister Alexander Novak, head of Russia's state-run nuclear corporation Rosatom Sergei Kirienko and CEO of Russian energy giant Gazprom Alexei Miller.

No details about the talks have yet surfaced in the media.

Speaking ahead of the closed-door talks, which came a day after attending the opening ceremony of the inaugural European Games hosted by Azerbaijan Republic, Erdogan pointed out that no European Union leaders had made it to the games.

"Turkey, a candidate for EU entry, represented the whole European Union," Putin responded jokingly in televised remarks.

The two leaders last met in December, when the Russian president made a day-long state visit to Turkey.

Turkey has persistently supported the foreign-backed militants in the war against the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad. Erdogan has made no secret of the fact that he wants to see the overthrow of the Syrian head of state.

Russia, meanwhile, has supported the Syrian government in its resistance against the intruding Takfiri terrorists which come from various parts of the world and are heavily supported and financed by Turkey and most Persian Gulf Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait.

Syria has been grappling with a deadly crisis since March 2011.The conflict has reportedly left more than 230,000 people, including almost 11,500 children, dead up until now.

MFB/NN/HRB