MOSCOW, Sept 8: Russia plans to set up a hotline with Turkey to ease tension on the borders of Armenia and Azerbaijan. which are locked in undeclared war. and their southern neighbours Iran and Turkey, reports Reuter

" We must step up efforts to settle the Karabakh conflict, to prevent the conflicting sides and thetr neighbours from turning this Into an international dispute." Foreign Ministry spokesman Georgy Karasin said on Tuesday

Thousands of people have died in the five year conflict between Karabakh Armenians, with support from Yerevan, and Azeris over Nagorno-Karabakh.