Facts about Russia-Ukraine conflict: Russia's missile strike damages key bridge in Ukraine's south

KIEV -- A missile strike carried out by Russian forces has damaged a key road-railway bridge over the Dniester Estuary in Ukraine's southern Odesa region, the Odesa City Council said Tuesday.

The bridge connects the Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi district with other districts of the Odesa region, local authorities said in a statement on Telegram.

The circumstances and information about the victims are being clarified, the statement said.

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MOSCOW -- Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and visiting United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday agreed on the need to continue the negotiation process and seek a diplomatic solution to the Ukrainian crisis.

"We stand in favor of a negotiated solution," Lavrov said during a joint press conference with Guterres after their talks in Moscow, noting that Russia agreed to begin negotiations in early March immediately after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had proposed.

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MOSCOW -- Russia said Tuesday that it is expelling three Swedish diplomats in response to the "unjustified" expulsion of three Russian diplomats in Stockholm and Sweden's military support for Ukraine.

The Russian Foreign Ministry summoned the Swedish ambassador to Russia on Tuesday and declared three diplomats of the Swedish Embassy in Russia "persona non grata," said the ministry in a statement.

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ANKARA -- Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday once again urged his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to hold a summit with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

During a phone talk, Erdogan told Putin that the "continuation of the positive momentum achieved in the Istanbul talks" to reach peace in Ukraine is in the interest of everyone, the Turkish presidential press service said in a statement.

The president reiterated his proposal to increase the level of the "Istanbul process, which is a very important threshold in the negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, to the level of leaders," said the statement.