Russia, the United States and the United Nations will hold talks on Syria in Geneva on Friday as diplomatic efforts to end the conflict are ratcheted up, Moscow and Washington announced.

Russia, the United States and the United Nations will hold talks on Syria in Geneva on Friday as diplomatic efforts to end the conflict are ratcheted up, Moscow and Washington announced.

"We will be having consultations in the trilateral format -- Russia, the United States and the UN," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov told the RIA Novosti state news agency on Wednesday.

He added that UN peace envoy Staffan de Mistura was also set to take part in the talks aimed at ending the deadly crisis.

US State Department spokesman John Kirby said Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs Anne Patterson would represent the US at the meeting to discuss moving forward on a political transition in Syria and "trying to get at the framework and the architecture for a ceasefire".

Gatilov said Russia would be calling for the "intensification of joint efforts" in the "fight against terrorism".

The talks mark the latest step in the Vienna process that began in late October when 17 countries, including the UN and EU representatives, met to discuss a political solution to end the fighting between the Syrian government and the insurgents.

The next meeting between top diplomats in the Vienna process is expected to take place this month in New York.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, in a call with his US counterpart John Kerry on Wednesday, said they needed to draw up a list of "terrorist groups that we must not talk to and that we must fight together", his ministry said.
Kerry said he would visit Moscow next week.