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U.S. President Joe Biden and Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan will on Monday discuss strained relations between the two NATO allies in their first face-to-face meeting since Biden took office, but there is little hope for a major breakthrough.

Turkey has the Western alliance's second-biggest military after the United States but Ankara's purchase of Russian defense systems, disagreements over Syria, human rights, the treatment of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire and tensions in the eastern Mediterranean have hurt ties.

The most challenging problem has been Turkey's purchase of the Russian S-400 systems, a rift that also divides NATO. Washington has already removed Ankara from the F-35 fighter jet program and imposed sanctions over the acquisition.

As president, Biden has recognised the 1915 massacre of Armenians as genocide and stepped up criticism of Turkey's human rights record, adopting a cooler tone towards Erdogan than his predecessor Donald Trump.

White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said the two leaders would also touch on Afghanistan, Libya and China.

"They will talk about political and economic issues that are more challenging ... that have been challenges in our relationship, including human rights-related issues," Sullivan told reporters on Sunday.

One area where Erdogan hopes to showcase a central Turkish role in NATO is Afghanistan, where Turkey has offered to guard and operate Kabul airport to secure access to the country after the U.S.-prompted NATO withdrawal.

At the start of the main leaders' session at NATO, Biden spoke to Erdogan at length in a small group before they took their seats. He is expected to hold a news conference at 1800 GMT.

Leaving Turkey, Erdogan said he expected an "unconditional approach" from Biden to moving on from past troubles.

"Turkey is not just any country, it is an allied country. We are two NATO allies," he told reporters.

"There are many issues regarding defence industry that were left on the table. The most important one of these is the F-35 issue," Erdogan said.

Before the summit, Erdogan met French President Emmanuel Macron. Ankara and Paris have been at odds over Syria, Libya, and Turkish criticism of the fight against what Macron calls Islamist separatism, among other issues.

Macron and Erdogan discussed working together on Libya and Syria while the French president said his country and its secular laws respected all religions, including Islam.

But with so many points of contention, hopes for any substantial breakthrough are slim.

“While both sides are expected to pursue some pragmatic engagement and neither is interested in a showdown, the meeting will not provide Erdogan with any meaningful dividend,” consultancy Teneo said ahead of the talks. (Reuters)

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Monday that New Zealand’s Muslim community should be the focus of any film about the Christchurch mosque attacks after some people raised objections to a movie focussing on her response to the bloodshed.

A film called “They Are Us” is being planned about the attacks on two mosques by a white supremacist gunman on March 15, 2019, in which 51 people were killed, the Hollywood Reporter said last week.

The magazine described the film as an "inspirational story" about Ardern's response to the violence.

Ardern's office said last week she and the government had no involvement with the film. Asked about it at a news conference, she said the Muslim community should be at the centre of any film about the shootings, not her.

"This is very raw event for New Zealand and even more so for the community that experienced it," Ardern said.

"I agree that there are stories that at some point should be told from March 15. But they are the stories from our Muslim community so they need to be at the centre of that. I don't consider mine to be one of the stories that needs to be told," she said.

She said, however, it was not for her to say whether a project should go ahead or not.

The film's title is drawn from Ardern's words on the day of the shootings. The 40-year-old leader's compassionate response united her shocked country and was praised globally. 

New Zealander Andrew Niccol would write and direct the film, the Hollywood Reporter said. It quoted him as saying it was not so much about the attacks but Ardern's handling of it.

But some Muslims questioned the plan to make a film when the pain of victims' families, friends and the wider community was still so raw. They also questioned the plan to focus the film on the prime minister and not the victims.

Muslim community advocate Guled Mire told the 1 NEWS network that he thought the film was "distasteful".

"It completely feeds into this white saviour mentality," he said.

Armed with high-capacity semi-automatic weapons, Australian Brenton Tarrant killed the 51 people and injured dozens when he opened fire in the two mosques during Friday prayers in Christchurch.

Tarrant was last year sentenced to life in prison without parole. (Reuters)

Myanmar’s ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi went on trial on Monday, appearing unwell as the first witnesses took the stand in cases against her of illegally possessing walkie-talkie radios and breaking coronavirus protocols, her lawyer said.

Suu Kyi, 75, faces a slew of charges since being overthrown by the army in a Feb. 1 coup that cut short a decade of tentative democratic reforms and has plunged the Southeast Asian country into chaos.

"Daw Aung San Suu Kyi seemed not very well but throughout the hearing she seemed quite interested and paid keen attention," the head of her legal team, Khin Maung Zaw, said in a statement after the day of hearings.

Suu Kyi’s supporters say the charges are politically motivated and designed to end the political life of a woman who championed democracy for decades under previous military administrations, much of the time under house arrest. 

The Nobel Peace Prize laureate faced three cases on Monday at the specially built court in the capital Naypyidaw, where she had already appeared at preliminary hearings.

Two of Monday's cases were linked to the possession of the radios and one under the Natural Disaster Management Law for breaching coronavirus regulations while campaigning for the election she won last November.

She also faces charges of incitement - with hearings set for Tuesday - and more serious charges of violating the Official Secrets Act and under the Anti-Corruption Law.

Former President Win Myint also faces charges of violating the coronavirus measures. Police Major Myint Naing took the stand against him and Suu Kyi. Police Major Kyi Lin then testified in the cases over the radios. 

Monday's hearings lasted more than five hours.

Her legal team have denied any wrongdoing by Suu Kyi and her chief lawyer, Khin Maung Zaw, called the most recent corruption charges "absurd".

'BOGUS, AND POLITICALLY MOTIVATED'

Phil Robertson, Deputy Asia Director, Human Rights Watch, said in a statement the charges Suu Kyi faced "are bogus, and politically motivated" and "should be dropped, resulting in her immediate and unconditional release". 

The army says it took power by force because Suu Kyi's party won the election through fraud, an accusation rejected by the previous election commission and international monitors.

Myanmar's security forces have killed at least 862 people during their crackdown on protests since the coup, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, an activist group, though the junta disputes the number.

Pro-democracy supporters took to the streets of the main city of Yangon on Monday, some chanting "revolutionary war, we participate", according to social media posts.

Some activists said they planned to stage a series of strikes and protests on Monday to coincide with the birthday of Che Guevara, a Latin American revolutionary who became an international icon after his death. 

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said on Friday that violence was intensifying and condemned the army's "outrageous" use of heavy weapons.

Bachelet said the junta had shown no willingness to implement a five-point consensus it agreed with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in April to halt violence and start dialogue with its opponents.

In a press release, Myanmar's junta-led ministry of foreign affairs rejected Bachelet's statement, questioning the accuracy and impartiality of the report.

"The report neither mentioned nor condemned the acts of sabotage and terrorism committed by the unlawful associations and terrorist groups as well as the sufferings and deaths of the security forces," it said.

The junta has branded a rival National Unity Government set up by supporters of Suu Kyi as a terrorist group and blamed it for bombings, arson and killings.

Myanmar’s junta-controlled media on Monday accused an ethnic armed group of killing 25 construction workers in the east of the country after abducting a group of 47 people last month.

Reuters was unable to reach the Karen National Defence Organisation (KNDO) for comment on the accusation. The junta spokesman did not answer calls to seek further comment. (Reuters)

Indonesia is preparing to receive thousands of deportees from Malaysia, a government official said on Friday, amid a crackdown there on undocumented workers and as the country suffers its most severe coronavirus outbreak so far.

Malaysia will send back about 7,200 people to Indonesia, which wants the most vulnerable people, including women and children held in detention centres, to be returned first, said Femmy Eka Kartika Putri of Indonesia's coordinating ministry for human development.

Millions of undocumented workers from Indonesia, Myanmar and Nepal and Bangladesh work in Malaysia, often in the plantation, construction and manufacturing sectors.

But Malaysia has toughened its stance during the pandemic, arresting and deporting thousands of undocumented migrants. Coronavirus cases and deaths hit record levels last month in Malaysia, which has the most cases per capita in Southeast Asia.

Malaysia's foreign ministry directed queries on the move to the immigration department, which declined to comment, but the plan comes amid a nationwide lockdown, in place until June 14.

Wahyu Susilo, founder of the Migrant Care, a non-governmental group, said authorities were scrambling to accommodate the planned influx, with no system in place to ensure adequate care, such as social assistance.

"There are no specific mitigation efforts post-deportation," he said. (Reuters)