Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan met Pope Francis on Monday in talks focused on Jerusalem and the fallout from US President Donald Trump's decision to recognize the holy city as the capital of Israel.

Both have expressed concern at the move that many US allies say could doom Middle East peace efforts. The Vatican backs a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, with both sides agreeing on the status of Jerusalem - home to sites holy to the Muslim, Jewish and Christian religions - as part of the peace process.

The Turkish President has previously clashed with the pope when Francis, in 2015, became the first head of the Roman Catholic Church to publicly call the 1915 killing of as many as 1.5 million Armenians "genocide" - something Turkey has always denied.

It was the first visit to the Vatican by a Turkish president in 59 years and the two men also discussed Syria, Iraq, humanitarian aid and refugees.

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