TOP HEADLINES

• Ukraine's top negotiator says enough progress has been made at the talks in Turkey to enable a meeting between the presidents of the two countries.

• Ukraine has proposed adopting neutral status in exchange for security guarantees, meaning it would not join military alliances or host military bases, Ukrainian negotiators said on Tuesday. 

• Russia said it would drastically reduce its military action near Kyiv and Chernihiv to help build trust. However, Russia's promise to scale down military operations does not represent a ceasefire, Moscow's lead negotiator in talks with Ukraine said on Tuesday.

• Washington has not seen "signs of real seriousness" from Russia in pursuing peace in Ukraine, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Tuesday.

• Among the attendees at the talks was sanctioned Russian oligarch and Chelsea Football Club owner Roman Abramovich. The Kremlin has described reports that Abramovich was poisoned earlier this month as being part of an "information war".

• World share markets surged and global borrowing costs climbed on Tuesday, as the talks yielded signs of progress. The British pound rose against the dollar and fell against a strengthening euro.

• Oil prices dipped as the ruble surged by more than 10 percent against the dollar while oil fell by more than five percent.

• Ukraine's government bond prices climbed further on Tuesday, hitting their highest since the start of the conflict.

• Nearly 5,000 people, including about 210 children, have been killed in the southern Ukrainian city of Mariupol since the conflict began, a spokesperson for the mayor said.

• At least seven people were killed and 22 injured in a Russian strike which hit the regional government building in the southern Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv, a key port city that has been under heavy assault for weeks, the regional governor said.

• The Kremlin said that due to the "economic war" against Russia, foreign companies need to buy rubles and pay for gas in the Russian currency, as Moscow seeks to shield itself from sanctions.

• Ukraine says it is resuming the evacuation of civilians from war-ravaged regions after a one-day pause over what it called the threat of Russian attacks.

• Russia's defense ministry said that it had destroyed a large fuel depot in Ukraine's Rivne region with cruise missiles on Monday evening, the Interfax news agency reported.

• The chief of the UN atomic watchdog, Rafael Grossi, is in Ukraine to discuss "the safety and security of the country's nuclear facilities," the International Atomic Energy Agency said on Tuesday.

• Russia's defense minister says his country will respond appropriately if NATO supplies planes and and air defenses to Ukraine.

• Finland must brace for Russian interference and hybrid attacks as it weighs whether to join the NATO military alliance, its security services warned on Tuesday.

•  UAE's Emirates airlines will continue to fly to Russia until its owners tell them not to, company president Tim Clark said on Tuesday.

•  Ratings agency Fitch said on Tuesday it has withdrawn its ratings of 27 Russian banks, four of their affiliates and related financing special purpose vehicles. 

•  Japan will ban the export of high-end cars and other luxury goods to Russia in its latest response to the conflict in Ukraine, the trade ministry said on Tuesday.

IN DETAIL

Ukraine's neutral status

Russia and Ukraine have ended their first face-to-face talks in Istanbul. 

Ukraine proposed adopting neutral status in exchange for security guarantees at the latest round of talks with Russia, meaning it would not join military alliances or host military bases, Ukrainian negotiators said on Tuesday.

The proposals would also include a 15-year consultation period on the status of annexed Crimea and could come into force only in the event of a complete ceasefire, the negotiators told reporters in Istanbul.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan welcomed delegations from both sides saying that "stopping this tragedy" was up to them.

Ukrainian television reported the talks had begun with "a cold welcome" and no handshake between the delegations.

Ukraine reopens humanitarian corridors

Ukraine says it is resuming the evacuation of civilians from war-scarred regions after a one-day pause over what it called the threat of Russian attacks.

Ukraine said on Tuesday it had reopened humanitarian corridors and evacuated civilians from war-scarred regions after a one-day pause over what Kyiv called possible Russian "provocations".

"Three humanitarian corridors were agreed for today," Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said in a video statement posted on Telegram, a day after announcing their closure citing intelligence reports.

The first corridor will be from the battered city of Mariupol to Zaporizhzhia using private cars, with Mariupol residents who had made it to Berdyansk also joining, she said.

A second corridor will require the evacuees to travel from the Russian-occupied town of Melitopol to Zaporizhzhia.