The press-secretary of the Russian president, Dmitry Peskov, earlier said that the meeting went well and lasted longer than planned.
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The U.S. backs some of the rebel groups against Assad, considering them relative moderates.
The spokesman added: “In a phone conversation with Putin a week before the G20 summit, Erdogan said ‘Eid al-Adha is coming”. Though Obama didn’t identify specific instances, he said “we have had problems with cyber intrusions from Russian Federation in the past” and that the goal is to not to duplicate a “cycle of escalation” that has occurred in arms races of the past.
Yet Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin both claimed to have had firm and productive talks about ending the civil war in Syria and focussing their military assets against Isis.
The exchange came after talks between Secretary of State John Kerry and his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov failed to result in a Syria ceasefire agreement.
On Aug. 26, Kerry met with Lavrov in Geneva to try to build momentum for the proposal.
A senior USA official said of the meeting between Obama and Putin, “It was constructive”.
“We had some productive talks about what a cessation of hostilities would look like for Russian Federation and the United States to focus on our common enemies”, he said.
The president said expressed concerns about cybersecurity issues with Putin, but would not detail the discussions.
The official said the USA has been focused on making sure that the agreement allows for a “period of calm so that we can get urgently needed humanitarian assistance to populations that are in need”.
Still, as Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin attended an economic summit, the leaders were under pressure to push the negotiations beyond the sticking points that have thus far prevented a deal. The president used an alternative exit, but quarrels with Chinese officials broke out on the tarmac and at other venues over access by US officials and the traveling press. Obama is scheduled to hold a news conference later Monday.
The pair also discussed Ukraine and Russia’s cyber intrusions, the official said.
State Department officials have declined to elaborate on what the sticking points are preventing a deal, though the US official said the remaining differences revolved around how the plan would be implemented.
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Mr Obama said talks with Mr Putin centred on how “to institute a meaningful, serious, verifiable cessation of hostilities in Syria, and our capacity to provide some humanitarian relief” there.
