PARIS - U.S. President Barack Obama urged Turkey on Tuesday to reduce tensions with Russia that are hampering efforts to fight Islamic State militants in Syria and stressed that U.S. support for its NATO ally's security remained steadfast.

Obama met Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan in Paris, where they have been attending an international climate summit, a week after Turkish jets shot down a Russian warplane along the Syrian border.

"The United States supports Turkey’s right to defend itself and its airspace and its territory," Obama said. "We discussed how Turkey and Russia can work together to de-escalate tensions and find a diplomatic path to resolve this issue."

Obama told Erdogan that the Islamic State militant group, also known as ISIL, was the entity that all sides needed to pursue, echoing a message he delivered to Russian President Vladimir Putin in Paris on Monday.

"We all have a common enemy, and that is ISIL, and I want to make sure that we focus on that threat," Obama said.

Tensions between Russia and Turkey have complicated U.S. efforts to prod Moscow into steering its military might towards Islamic State rather than the moderate Syrian opposition. Putin supports Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, while Obama and Erdogan want him to go. (Reuters)