Russia, Ukraine conduct prisoner swap amid new round of talks

Moscow, July 24 (IANS) Russia and Ukraine have exchanged prisoners of conflict as delegations of the two countries held their third round of direct talks in the city of Istanbul, Turkey.

The swap was conducted in accordance with the agreements both sides reached during their last talks on June 2 in Istanbul, the Russian Defence Ministry said on Wednesday in a statement.

The Russian servicemen are in Belarus and will be transported to Russia for treatment and rehabilitation in military medical institutions, it added.

Russia and Ukraine held two rounds of direct talks on May 16 and June 2 in Istanbul, Xinhua news agency reported.

During the second round, they agreed on an "all-for-all" exchange of seriously ill and wounded prisoners, and soldiers under the age of 25, as well as the transfer of the bodies of fallen soldiers.

More than 1,000 Ukrainian servicemen have returned home in accordance with the Istanbul agreements, according to Ukraine's Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War.

"We have progress on the humanitarian track, with no progress on a cessation of hostilities," Ukraine's chief delegate Rustem Umerov said after talks that lasted just 40 minutes.

Russia's chief delegate Vladimir Medinsky said the point of a leaders' meeting should be to sign an agreement, not to "discuss everything from scratch".

He renewed Moscow's call for a series of short ceasefires of 24-48 hours to enable the retrieval of bodies.

Ukraine said it wants an immediate and much longer ceasefire.

The talks took place just over a week after US President Donald Trump threatened heavy new sanctions on Russia and countries that buy its exports unless a peace deal was reached within 50 days.

There was no sign of any progress towards that goal, although both sides said there was discussion of further humanitarian exchanges following a series of prisoner swaps, the latest of which took place on Wednesday.

Medinsky said the negotiators agreed to exchange at least 1,200 more prisoners of war from each side, and Russia had offered to hand over another 3,000 Ukrainian bodies.

--IANS

int/khz