By Gunay Hasanova

A meeting between the Russian and Turkish Presidents, Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is being prepared but will take place not earlier than 2017, Russian President’s Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov said on November 28.

Peskov said that there is understanding that it may take place very soon.

"The volume of our bilateral relations is impressive and we have a lot to restore," he said. "There are expansion plans in many areas. Now, the intergovernmental commission is working on to uplift these plans to the interstate level, to the level of the two countries’ presidents”, Peskov added.

Earlier, the two presidents has a telephone conversation, during which they agreed

to hold a meeting of Russia-Turkey High-Level Cooperation Council and continue the dialogue at the upcoming G-20 summit in St. Petersburg.

Moreover, Turkey’s Prime Minister Binali Yildirim will pay an official visit to Russia on December 6-7.

The Turkish PM and his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev are expected to discuss further steps on normalization of relations between the two countries.

The agenda of negotiations reportedly will cover the issues of using national currencies in the trade between Russia and Turkey, creation of free trade zone, development of tourism, as well as the fight against the “Islamic State” (aka IS, ISIL, ISIS or Daesh) terrorist group in Syria and Iraq.

The Turkish prime minister is also expected to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Relations between Turkey and Russia broke down for about seven months after Turkey shot down a Russian warplane in November 2015. However, relations have improved since the August meeting of the two presidents.

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Gunay Hasanova is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @gunhasanova

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