The Russian military said its warplanes suspended all sorties over Syria on Saturday in line with a ceasefire deal brokered by Russia and the United States, to avoid any "bombing mistakes".

The Russian and American militaries also exchanged maps of Syria, while fighting stopped in 34 Syrian settlements, the military said.

Russia on Friday halted the deportation of three Syrian asylum seekers to Damascus in a last-minute reprieve after an outcry from rights groups including Amnesty International, activists said.

Officials on Thursday had escorted the three men from war-ravaged Aleppo to Moscow's Vnukovo airport and held them under guard prior to an evening flight to Damascus, before Russian officials axed the decision.

Russia was set to deport three Syrian refugees on Thursday back to Damascus from a Moscow airport, rights activists said, in a move condemned as "shameful" by Amnesty International.

"One has just called... they are being held under guard, under police escort," head of the migrant rights group The Civic Assistance Committee, told AFP around 1500 GMT.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi acknowledged for the first time on Wednesday that "terrorism" caused a Russian plane crash in the Sinai Peninsula in October that killed 224 people.

"Has terrorism ended? No... Whoever downed that plane, what did he want? Just to hit tourism? No. To hit relations. To hit relations with Russia," Sisi said in a speech.

The European Court of Human Rights ruled Tuesday that Russia's conviction of opposition leader and blogger Alexei Navalny on charges of embezzlement was "prejudicial", saying he had been deprived of a fair trial.

The Strasbourg-based court said the 2013 conviction of Navalny and co-accused Pyotr Ofitserov, a businessman, was based on an "arbitrary application of the law".

A ruthless and corrupt leader with his own private army who has carved out de facto independence for his restive region: Russia's opposition on Tuesday lashed out at Chechen strongman leader Ramzan Kadyrov in a new report.

The report -- authored by prominent opposition figure Ilya Yashin and entitled "National security threat" -- alleges that Kadyrov has been allowed by President Vladimir Putin to turn Chechnya into a personal fiefdom beyond the control of the central authorities.

The U.N. Security Council will hold an emergency meeting on Friday at Russia's request to discuss the crisis in Syria, diplomats said.

The meeting scheduled for 2000 GMT was called to address Turkey's proposal for ground forces to be deployed in Syria, the Russian foreign ministry said in Moscow.

Russia is accusing Turkey of helping jihadists recruit fighters from the Caucasus and Central Asia to fight in Syria, according to a letter sent to the U.N. Security Council.

Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said in the letter dated February 10 that recruiters from the Islamic State group had reportedly established a network in the Turkish city of Antalya for foreign fighters from the former Soviet Union.

Russia has filed a lawsuit against Ukraine at the High Court in London over a disputed $3 billion loan that Moscow says Kiev has refused to pay back, the finance minister said Wednesday.

"Today the Russian finance ministry filed the lawsuit against Ukraine with the goal of recovering debt on Ukraine's bond with the nominal value of $3 billion," Finance Minister Anton Siluanov was quoted by Russian news agencies as saying.

The United States on Monday urged Turkey and Russia to avoid any further escalation after the two traded verbal blows over their respective military actions in war-torn Syria.

"It is important that the Russians and Turks speak directly, and take measures to prevent escalation," a State Department spokesperson told AFP.