U.S. President Barack Obama sparred with Russia's Vladimir Putin on Monday (June 17) over how to end the war in Syria, during an icy encounter at a G8 summit where divisions over the conflict eclipsed the rest of the agenda.

"And with respect to Syria we do have different perspectives on the problem but we share an interest reducing the violence, securing chemical weapons, ensuring they are never used or subject to proliferation. And that we want to try and resolve the issue through political means if possible, so we will instruct our teams to continue to work on the potential to work on the potential to a Geneva follow up to the first meeting," Obama said.

"Of course our opinions do not coincide but all of us have the intention to stop the violence in Syria, to stop the growth of victims and to solve the situation peacefully, including by bringing the parties to the negotiations table in Geneva. We agreed to push the parties to the negotiations table," Putin said.