OREANDA-NEWS. Defense Ministers of Turkey and Russia Hulusi Akar and Sergei Shoigu discussed by telephone measures to reduce the escalation in Syrian Idlib, the Turkish Defense Ministry said in a statement. Earlier on Tuesday, the head of the communications department of the presidential administration of Turkey, Fahrettin Altun, said that the country's president, Tayyip Erdogan, during a telephone conversation with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, expressed concern about serious violations of the truce in Idlib and accused the Syrian authorities of them.

"Erdogan during a telephone conversation with Putin noted that violations of the Syrian armistice regime in the de-escalation zone in Idlib reached alarming proportions. Attacks on civilians, schools and hospitals cannot be explained by the fight against terrorism," Altun wrote on Twitter. "The regime's goal is to sabotage Russian-Turkish cooperation on Idlib, this can damage the spirit of Astana and lead to the risk of rising tensions, disrupting the political process in Syria and forming a constitutional committee," the administration official said.

"The defense ministers of Turkey and Russia held a telephone conversation, during which they discussed the latest events in Idlib, as well as measures to be taken to reduce the escalation in the region," the statement said. It is noted that the parties discussed the topics of regional security in the framework of the agreement signed in Sochi. Following the talks between the presidents of Russia and Turkey - the guarantor countries of the truce in Syria - in Sochi on September 17, 2018, the defense ministers of the two countries signed a memorandum on stabilizing the situation in the Idlib de-escalation zone and agreed to create a demilitarized zone in Idlib. The armed conflict in Syria has been going on since 2011.