Kremlin says Russia is still ready for prisoner swap with Ukraine despite problems
Russia accused Ukraine on Saturday of indefinitely postponing the exchanges, something Kyiv denied.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Monday repeated Russian accusations against Ukraine.
"We have seen and heard a hundred different excuses, justifications and so on, but it is difficult to view them as credible," Peskov told reporters.
"The Russian side remains ready to implement the agreements reached in Istanbul."
The exchanges were agreed to during a second round of direct peace talks in Istanbul on June 2 and are meant to see a new prisoner of war swap of at least 1,200 POWs - focusing on the youngest and most severely wounded - as well as the repatriation of thousands of bodies of those killed in the war.
The return of prisoners of war and the return of the bodies of the dead is one of the few things the two sides had been able to agree on, even as their broader negotiations have failed to get close to ending the war, now in its fourth year.
Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky said on Saturday that the Russian side had shown up at the agreed exchange point with the bodies of 1,212 Ukrainian dead soldiers only to find nobody from Ukraine to take them. He said a first list of 640 POWs had also been handed to Ukraine in order to begin the exchange.
Ukrainian officials rejected those accusations and President Volodymyr Zelenskiy vowed on Sunday to press on with prisoner exchanges despite tensions around the issue.
He said though that Ukraine had not yet received a full list of prisoners to be released and accused Moscow of "trying to play some kind of dirty political and information game."
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Reuters
a minute ago
- Reuters
Exclusive: Putin's demand to Ukraine: give up Donbas, no NATO and no Western troops, sources say
MOSCOW, Aug 21 (Reuters) - Vladimir Putin is demanding that Ukraine give up all of the eastern Donbas region, renounce ambitions to join NATO, remain neutral and keep Western troops out of the country, three sources familiar with top-level Kremlin thinking told Reuters. The Russian president met Donald Trump in Alaska on Friday for the first Russia-U.S. summit in more than four years and spent almost all of their three-hour closed meeting discussing what a compromise on Ukraine might look like, according to the sources who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive matters. Speaking afterwards beside Trump, Putin said the meeting would hopefully open up the road to peace in Ukraine - but neither leader gave specifics about what they discussed. In the most detailed Russian-based reporting to date on Putin's offer at the summit, Reuters was able to outline the contours of what the Kremlin would like to see in a possible peace deal to end a war that has killed and injured hundreds of thousands of people. In essence, the Russian sources said, Putin has compromised on territorial demands he laid out in June 2024, which required Kyiv to cede the entirety of the four provinces Moscow claims as part of Russia: Dontesk and Luhansk in eastern Ukraine - which make up the Donbas - plus Kherson and Zaporizhzhia in the south. Kyiv rejected those terms as tantamount to surrender. In his new proposal, the Russian president has stuck to his demand that Ukraine completely withdraw from the parts of the Donbas it still controls, according to the three sources. In return, though, Moscow would halt the current front lines in Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, they added. Russia controls about 88% of the Donbas and 73% of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, according to U.S. estimates and open-source data. Moscow is also willing to hand over the small parts of the Kharkiv, Sumy, and Dnipropetrovsk regions of Ukraine it controls as part of a possible deal, the sources said. Putin is sticking, too, to his previous demands that Ukraine give up its NATO ambitions and for a legally binding pledge from the U.S.-led military alliance that it will not expand further eastwards, as well as for limits on the Ukrainian army and an agreement that no Western troops will be deployed on the ground in Ukraine as part of a peacekeeping force, the sources said. Yet the two sides remain far apart, more than three years after Putin ordered thousands of Russian troops into Ukraine in a full-scale invasion that followed the annexation of the Crimean peninsula in 2014 and prolonged fighting in the country's east between Russian-backed separatists and Ukrainian troops. Ukraine's foreign ministry had no immediate comment on the proposals. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has repeatedly dismissed the idea of withdrawing from internationally recognised Ukrainian land as part of a deal, and has said the industrial Donbas region serves as a fortress holding back Russian advances deeper into Ukraine. "If we're talking about simply withdrawing from the east, we cannot do that," he told reporters in comments released by Kyiv on Thursday. "It is a matter of our country's survival, involving the strongest defensive lines." Joining NATO, meanwhile, is a strategic objective enshrined in the country's constitution and one which Kyiv sees as its most reliable security guarantee. Zelenskiy said it was not up to Russia to decide on the alliance's membership. The White House and NATO didn't immediately respond to requests for comment on the Russian proposals. Political scientist Samuel Charap, chair in Russia and Eurasia Policy at RAND, a U.S.-based global policy think-tank, said any requirement for Ukraine to withdraw from the Donbas remained a non-starter for Kyiv, both politically and strategically. "Openness to 'peace' on terms categorically unacceptable to the other side could be more of a performance for Trump than a sign of a true willingness to compromise," he added. "The only way to test that proposition is to begin a serious process at the working level to hash out those details." TRUMP: PUTIN WANTS TO SEE IT ENDED Russian forces currently control a fifth of Ukraine, an area about the size of the American state of Ohio, according to U.S. estimates and open-source maps. The three sources close to the Kremlin said the summit in the Alaskan city of Anchorage had ushered in the best chance for peace since the war began because there had been specific discussions about Russia's terms and Putin had shown a willingness to give ground. "Putin is ready for peace - for compromise. That is the message that was conveyed to Trump," one of the people said. The sources cautioned that it was unclear to Moscow whether Ukraine would be prepared to cede the remains of the Donbas, and that if it did not then the war would continue. Also unclear was whether or not the United States would give any recognition to Russian-held Ukrainian territory, they added. A fourth source said that though economic issues were secondary for Putin, he understood the economic vulnerability of Russia and the scale of the effort needed to go far further into Ukraine. Trump has said he wants to end the "bloodbath" of the war and be remembered as a "peacemaker president". He said on Monday he had begun arranging, opens new tab a meeting between the Russian and Ukrainian leaders, to be followed by a trilateral summit with the U.S. president. "I believe Vladimir Putin wants to see it ended," Trump said beside Zelenskiy in the Oval office. "I feel confident we are going to get it solved." Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Thursday that Putin was prepared to meet Zelenskiy but that all issues had to be worked through first and there was a question about Zelenskiy's authority to sign a peace deal. Putin has repeatedly raised doubts about Zelenskiy's legitimacy as his term in office was due to expire in May 2024 but the war means no new presidential election has yet been held. Kyiv says Zelenskiy remains the legitimate president. The leaders of Britain, France and Germany have said they are sceptical that Putin wants to end the war. Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff was instrumental in paving the way for the summit, and the latest drive for peace, according to two of the Russian sources. Witkoff met Putin in the Kremlin on August 6 with Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov. At the meeting, Putin conveyed clearly to Witkoff that he was ready to compromise and set out the contours of what he could accept for peace, according to two Russian sources. If Russia and Ukraine could reach an agreement, then there are various options for a formal deal - including a possible three-way Russia-Ukraine-U.S. deal that is recognised by the U.N. Security Council, one of the sources said. Another option is to go back to the failed 2022 Istanbul agreements, where Russia and Ukraine discussed Ukraine's permanent neutrality in return for security guarantees from the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council: Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States, the sources added. "There are two choices: war or peace, and if there is no peace, then there is more war," one of the people said.
The Guardian
31 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Russia upends Trump peace efforts with ‘foreign intervention' veto demand
Moscow threw Donald Trump's Ukraine peace initiative into disarray on Thursday, insisting it must have a veto over any postwar support for the country as its forces carried out a large-scale overnight missile barrage. In a series of hardline remarks, Russia's foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said European proposals to deploy troops in Ukraine after a settlement would amount to 'foreign intervention', which he called absolutely unacceptable for Russia. Lavrov said Russia wanted to return to discussing a framework first proposed during the initial peace talks held in Istanbul in 2022, under which Moscow and Beijing would help guarantee Ukraine's security alongside European allies – terms Kyiv considers unacceptable. 'We support the principles and security guarantees that were agreed … in April 2022,' Lavrov said. 'Anything else … is of course an absolutely futile undertaking,' the foreign minister added. European leaders are exploring possible security guarantees for Ukraine after the war, building on Trump's promise to back the country under any settlement with Russia. France, Britain and Estonia have indicated they could send troops to a postwar Ukraine, while several other nations said they might take part, though much depends on US involvement. Lavrov's comments cast doubt on the prospects for peace talks. After the recent Trump-Putin summit in Alaska, US officials said the Russian president had accepted the prospect of western security guarantees for Ukraine. But the latest statements suggest Moscow may be backing away from that understanding – or that Washington may have misinterpreted the Kremlin's position from the outset. Trump on Thursday appeared to vent his frustration at Russia's obstruction. In a post on Truth Social, the US president blamed his predecessor, Joe Biden, for not allowing Ukraine to 'fight back' against Russia. 'It is very hard, if not impossible, to win a war without attacking an invaders country. It's like a great team in sports that has a fantastic defense, but is not allowed to play offense. There is no chance of winning! It is like that with Ukraine and Russia. Crooked and grossly incompetent Joe Biden would not let Ukraine FIGHT BACK, only DEFEND. How did that work out? … Interesting times ahead!!!' Trump wrote. Trump's veiled threats against Russia will be welcomed in Kyiv and European capitals, though the US leader has previously backed away from imposing sanctions or boosting support for Ukraine. Lavrov also poured cold water on the prospect of a summit between the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, and the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, which has been touted by Trump. Lavrov said a bilateral meeting at the highest level would only be possible 'if all issues requiring discussion are thoroughly prepared'. He suggested that Putin would only meet Zelenskyy to accept Russia's maximalist conditions, which would entail Ukraine's capitulation. Russia's veteran foreign minister further questioned whether Zelenskyy had the legitimacy to sign any future peace accord, parroting a familiar Kremlin line that portrays Ukraine's leadership as illegitimate. Despite a flurry of diplomacy in recent days between Trump and his Russian and Ukrainian counterparts, the path to peace remains uncertain as Moscow has shown little willingness to climb down from its maximalist demands. Even so, the White House on Wednesday continued to strike a positive tone. 'President Trump and his national security team continue to engage with Russian and Ukrainian officials towards a bilateral meeting to stop the killing and end the war,' a White House spokesperson told Fox News. Speaking to foreign correspondents in Kyiv, Zelenskyy, who has agreed to meet Putin, said he would like a 'strong reaction' from Washington if the Russian leader was not willing to sit down for a bilateral meeting with him soon. 'I responded immediately to the proposal for a bilateral meeting: we are ready. But what if the Russians are not ready?' Zelenskyy said in comments released on Thursday from a briefing with reporters in Kyiv a day earlier. As uncertainty over peace talks persisted, Russia launched one of its heaviest bombardments in weeks. The Ukrainian military said Moscow fired 574 drones and 40 missiles in a major aerial assault that struck western regions, killing at least one person and injuring 15. Ukraine's foreign minister said a major US electronics manufacturer was among the targets. 'The message is clear: Russia is not looking for peace. Russia is attacking American business in Ukraine, humiliating American business,' Andy Hunder, president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Ukraine, said. Ukraine, for its part, has stepped up drone attacks on Russian infrastructure supporting the war, with strikes on oil refineries pushing wholesale gasoline prices in Russia to record highs.
Reuters
31 minutes ago
- Reuters
Exclusive: Military options for Ukraine developed and will be presented to Western national security advisers
Aug 21 (Reuters) - Military chiefs from the United States and a number of European countries have completed military options on Ukraine and will now present the options to their respective national security advisers, the U.S. military said on Thursday. Reuters has previously reported that U.S. and European military planners have begun exploring post-conflict security guarantees for Ukraine, following President Donald Trump's pledge to help protect the country under any deal to end Russia's war in Ukraine. "These options will be presented to each nation's respective national security advisers for appropriate consideration in ongoing diplomatic efforts," a U.S. military statement said. The meetings between the chiefs of defense for the United States, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, United Kingdom and Ukraine took place in Washington, D.C., between Tuesday and Thursday. Reuters was first to report on the completion of the plans that will be presented to the national security advisers. Ukraine and its European allies have been buoyed by Trump's promise during a summit on Monday of security guarantees for Kyiv, but many questions remain unanswered. Officials have cautioned that it would take time for U.S. and European planners to determine what would be both militarily feasible and acceptable to the Kremlin. One option was sending European forces to Ukraine but putting the U.S. in charge of their command and control, sources have told Reuters. Russia's Foreign Ministry has ruled out the deployment of troops from NATO countries to help secure a peace deal. Trump has publicly ruled out deploying U.S. troops in Ukraine but on Tuesday appeared to leave the door open to other U.S. military involvement. U.S. air support could come in a variety of ways, including providing more air defense systems to Ukraine and enforcing a no-fly zone with U.S. fighter jets. Trump has pressed for a quick end to Europe's deadliest war in 80 years, and Kyiv and its allies have worried he could seek to force an agreement on Russia's terms after the president last week rolled out the red carpet for Putin. Russia says it is engaged in a 'special military operation' in Ukraine to protect its national security, claiming NATO's eastward expansion and Western military support for Ukraine pose existential threats. Kyiv and its Western allies say the invasion is an imperial-style land grab.
