UPDATED 9.23am Prime Minister John Key has spoken to Russia's President Vladimir Putin, telling him he was open to re-starting trade talks when the time was right.

LISTEN ABOVE: NZ Herald deputy political editor Claire Trevett spoke to Rachel Smalley from Lima

Putin was the last leader on Key's tick list at Apec. New Zealand and Russia were on the cusp of finalising a trade deal when New Zealand suspended talks because of Russia's actions in Crimea.

Key said Russia had asked for those talks to re-start and he had indicated to Putin that could happen soon. However, it would depend on European leaders softening sanctions on Russia.

"I think he would probably prefer we made our own call but I think from New Zealand's point of view we would want to keep reasonably close to like-minded countries.

It's one of those situations where we don't want to get ahead of ourselves but we also don't want to be left behind."

Earlier, Key had said the talks were close to being finalised when New Zealand put them hold in 2014 because of Russia's involvement in Crimea. Key indicated that stance could be softening.

"We stayed pretty close to like-minded countries. That position is slowly changing, talking to a few European leaders recently. So over time I think we will want to look to progress the FTA [free trade agreement]."

Key said Russia was keen for New Zealand to return to the table. 

"As I would say to Putin and as I said to Prime Minister Medvedev, in principle yes we want to at some point. But we would want to do that at a point we thought was the appropriate time.

We are getting much closer to that. That's the feeling I get from European leaders is that things are starting to move, but we wouldn't want to get out in front of that."

He said one of the issues was that New Zealand was also negotiating with the European Union and would not want to slow that down.

He also wanted to talk to Putin about Syria, a ceasefire and the Assad regime.

New Zealand is on the Security Council with Russia until the end of the year. 

He said he had spoken with US Secretary of State John Kerry about Syria on Kerry's visit to New Zealand last week and there was general acceptance that any transition from Bashar al-Assad's government would have to be done over time.

Key's first day in Peru was dedicated to talking to the 11 other TPP leaders, but he was hoping to speak to Putin when the full 21 Apec leaders meet for the annual leader's retreat today.

After the election of Donald Trump in the United States there has been speculation about power plays by China and Russia positioning themselves to take advantage if the US go ahead with a more protectionist stance.

Although neither are in the Trans Pacific Partnership, both China and Russia are backing the Apec goal of a region wide free trade area and China is leading parallel trade negotiations of 16 countries, including New Zealand.

China's President Xi Jinping has done a South American tour in the lead up to Apec and the state-owned China Daily put out a special Peru edition to mark the occasion.

Putin's presence at the summit is also noteworthy - he rarely attends Apec meetings outside Russia, although he did go to Beijing in 2014.

Key said it was not surprising. "If the Americans have a lower profile role, others will look to fill that void and vaccuum. There's no question that the Chinese want to go forward on trade. Interestingly enough, the Russians might do as well. That might be a little more problemsome [sic] given where they are at the moment."

He said the free trade area was a long standing of all Apec countries. "The question now is what the US response might be."

THE SMALL TALK: KEY on PUTIN, OBAMA

Key admitted his relationship with Putin was not close although he did get on with Russia's Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev.

"Medvedev is a thoroughly engaging guy, Putin keeps much more to himself. So I don't know him that well really. He's just a slightly different character to Medvedev."

Key sat next to US President Barack Obama and Japan's Shinzo Abe at the banquet last night.

Obama had talked about his plans for life after politics: "obviously he's going to write a book and do a range of other things as you'd expect him to do."

"We've been to a lot of these things together, we know each other well so it was a pretty relaxed conversation."

He said he doubted Obama would visit New Zealand while President, but expected him to visit afterwards with his family.

Key also met with Australia's Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull for a drink last night - and Turnbull has now echoed Key's view that Trump could be persuaded to change his mind.

Key said today it was difficult to assess that without talking to Trump.

"It's hard to tell until you can have a serious conversation with President Trump about it and hard to see until you know who heads US trade for Donald Trump."