Ukraine and Russia agree on further prisoner swap after brief talks

Yahoo

2 days ago

Ukraine and Russia have agreed to another prisoner exchange during negotiations in Istanbul while making little other headway.
Ukrainian Defence Minister Rustem Umerov told journalists that the first priority was to exchange seriously injured and seriously ill prisoners of war.
The second category would be young soldiers between the ages of 18 and 25. The agreement, he said, had been reached on specific categories and "not on numbers."
The head of the Russian delegation, Vladimir Medinsky, confirmed the agreement on the exchange of prisoners in the categories mentioned. He said the aim is to exchange at least 1,000 prisoners of war in each group.
In addition, according to both sides, an agreement was also reached on the exchange of 6,000 bodies of soldiers killed in action.
Umerov said Kiev had proposed the end of June to the Russians as the next date for follow-up talks.
Ukraine also reiterated its call for a meeting at the highest level. "All key issues can only be resolved at the top leadership level," Umerov said, adding that US President Donald Trump's participation was also possible.
The proposals for the desired ceasefire had been handed over, he said. The Russian document was currently being evaluated, said Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Heorhii Tykhyi.
Ukraine has been fighting a Russian invasion with Western support for over three years.
Second round of talks was brief
Monday's talks - the second recent round of direct talks between Russia and Ukraine - were brief, running only a little over an hour.
The delegations met in Çırağan Palace in Istanbul, with Turkish officials acting as mediators.
Prior to the talks, the warring parties outlined their demands for an end to the fighting in written proposals, but their positions remain far apart.
The two countries met for the first round of direct talks since 2022 in mid-May, which resulted in the largest prisoner exchange since the beginning of the war, with 1,000 detainees released on each side.
The Russian delegation in Istanbul was again led by presidential adviser Medinsky, and the Ukrainian one by Defence Minister Umerov.
The talks were intended to discuss ways out of Russia's three-year war against Ukraine.
Kiev had demanded an unconditional 30-day ceasefire as a first step; Moscow had tied a ceasefire to conditions that included Western states refraining from supplying weapons to Ukraine.
In the days before the meeting, the two sides massively expanded their attacks, resulting in casualties and damage in both countries.
Ukraine on Sunday carried out one of its most ambitious attacks on Russian territory, hitting several airfields with remote combat drones.
List of 'abducted' children
During the second round of negotiations, Ukraine handed Russia a list of minors it considers to have been abducted.
"We are talking about hundreds of children whom Russia illegally deported, forcibly resettled or detained in the temporarily occupied territories," wrote Andriy Yermak, the head of the Ukrainian presidential office, on Telegram on Monday.
The return of these children is part of a just and stable peace. "Now the ball is in Russia's court," he continued.
Von derLeyen calls for new sanctions if Ukraine talks falter
Meanwhile, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Europe is prepared to impose new sanctions on Russia if peace negotiations do not advance.
She told German broadcaster ZDF on Monday that if Russian President Vladimir Putin does not take the talks seriously, the EU will go ahead with more sanctions against Russian targets, including the Nord Stream gas pipelines and the Russian shadow fleet.
Von der Leyen added that she had spoken with US Senator Lindsey Graham, who is preparing another package of sanctions for the US Senate.
The EU recently put its 17th package of sanctions against Russia into effect. An 18th package is already in the works, aimed in part at preventing the restart of the Nord Stream pipelines. Additional measures include further lowering the price cap on Russian oil and new sanctions targeting the Russian financial sector.
Russia unveils peace demands for Ukraine
Russia has for the first time publicly released a 12-point memorandum outlining its conditions for a peace settlement with Ukraine, state news agency TASS reported on Monday.
The document calls for Ukraine to recognize the annexation of Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhya as part of Russia — a demand Kiev rejects as illegal. It also insists Ukraine adopts a permanently neutral status and abandons any future aspirations to join NATO.
Other conditions include Ukraine remaining free of nuclear weapons, reducing the size of its armed forces and disbanding both nationalist military groups and the National Guard.
The Kremlin also demands that Russian be recognized as an official language and that the rights of Russian-speaking minorities be guaranteed.
Further requirements include lifting sanctions against Russia, restoring diplomatic relations and resuming the transit of Russian gas through Ukraine to Europe.
The memorandum proposes that any peace treaty be formalized through a legally binding UN Security Council resolution.
The document was handed over to Ukrainian representatives in Istanbul. Ukraine said it would review the proposal. Russia proposes two ceasefire options
According to Russian state media citing the Russian delegation's documents, Moscow also offered two ceasefire options during negotiations in Istanbul.
The first option requires Ukraine's full withdrawal from the four annexed regions — Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhya and Kherson — despite Russia controlling only parts of them.
Russian forces control nearly all of Luhansk, about 70% of Donetsk and roughly two-thirds of both Kherson and Zaporizhzhya regions. However, the regional capitals — Kherson and Zaporizhzhya — remain under Ukrainian control.
The second option calls for a ceasefire along the current front lines. Under the plan, Kiev would end mobilization efforts and stop receiving foreign weapons. A joint monitoring centre would be established to oversee compliance. Ukraine would also pledge to stop sabotage operations on Russian territory.
Once martial law is lifted, nationwide elections would be held within 100 days, according to the proposal.
Ukrainian officials also presented their own memorandum during the Istanbul talks, but the two sides remain far apart on core issues.