Ukraine and Russia have announced that it has exchanged prisoners of war “wounded and sick”

Russia and Ukraine announced this Thursday, June 12, after having had an exchange of war prisoners, a new stage in an agreement concluded during the recent negotiations between the two fields in Istanbul in Türkiye.

“Today, the soldiers of the Armed Forces, the National Guard and the border guards are back at home,” said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Telegram, and added that these were “seriously injured and very sick soldiers.”

Volodymyr Zelensky, whose country has been fighting for three years against the Russian invasion has published a photo of these Ukrainian soldiers, wrapped in national flags, welcomed their arrival at Ukraine.

1.212 Bodies of repatriated Ukrainian soldiers

“A group of Russian soldiers has been returned from the territory controlled by the kyiv regime,” said the Russian army, who confirmed the exchange.

The Russian state agency Tass transmitted in the process a brief video that shows the liberated Russian soldiers aligned, the Russian flags on the back.

Neither Kyiv nor Moscow said that the number of prisoners exchanged at this stage. On Wednesday, Ukraine announced that he had recovered 1,212 bodies of his soldiers killed in the front, one of the largest operations of the genre since the invasion launched by Moscow in February 2022.

Russian chief negotiator Vladimir Medinski said Russia had recovered 27 body from his soldiers.

The repatriation of the bodies of the soldiers and the exchanges of prisoners of war are the rare areas in which kyiv and Moscow have been cooperating since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine more than three years ago.

Recent direct peace conversations between Russia and Ukraine in Istanbul have resulted in any important advance, apart from advertisements about prisoners and the body of murdered soldiers.

Moscow has rejected the unconditional “truce” sought by Washington, kyiv and Europeans, while Ukraine has described Russia’s requirements as “ultimatums”, which he wants in particular that Ukraine gives him five entire regions.