Ukraine is working to renew prisoner exchanges with Russia that would carry house 1,200 Ukrainian prisoners, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stated Sunday, a day after his nationwide safety chief introduced progress in negotiations.
“We’re … relying on the resumption of POW exchanges,” Zelenskyy wrote on X.
“Many conferences, negotiations and calls are at the moment happening to make sure this.”
Rustem Umerov, Secretary of Ukraine’s Nationwide Safety and Protection Council, stated Saturday he held consultations mediated by Turkey and the United Arab Emirates on resuming exchanges. He stated the events agreed to activate prisoner trade agreements brokered in Istanbul to launch 1,200 Ukrainians. Moscow didn’t instantly remark.
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The Istanbul agreements check with prisoner-exchange protocols established with Turkish mediation in 2022 that set guidelines for big, coordinated swaps. Since then, Russia and Ukraine have traded 1000’s of prisoners, although exchanges have been sporadic.
Umerov stated technical consultations can be held quickly to finalize procedural and organizational particulars, expressing hope that returning Ukrainians might “have fun the New 12 months and Christmas holidays at house — on the household desk and subsequent to their kinfolk.”
In different developments, power infrastructure was broken by Russian drone strikes in a single day into Sunday in Ukraine’s Odesa area, Ukraine’s State Emergency Service stated. A solar energy plant was among the many broken websites.
Ukraine is desperately attempting to fend off relentless Russian aerial assaults which have introduced rolling blackouts throughout Ukraine on the point of winter.
Mixed missile and drone strikes on the facility grid have coincided with Ukraine’s efforts to carry again a Russian battlefield push aimed toward capturing the japanese stronghold of Pokrovsk.
Russia fired a complete of 176 drones and one missile in a single day, Ukraine’s air drive stated Sunday, including that Ukrainian forces shot down or neutralized 139 drones. On the entrance line, Russia’s Protection Ministry stated Sunday that its forces had taken two settlements in Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia area.
Russia’s larger and better-equipped military has scaled up its assaults, putting the short-handed Ukrainian army underneath extreme pressure. Ukrainian officers stated in September that the entrance line has grown in size to just about 1,250 kilometers.
Russia has paid a excessive worth in casualties and armor for its struggle of attrition, nonetheless, and Ukraine has held it to incremental battlefield beneficial properties.
Ukrainian forces struck a significant oil refinery in Russia’s Samara area, together with a warehouse storing drones for the elite Rubicon drone unit within the partially Russian-occupied Donetsk area, Ukraine’s common workers stated Sunday. Russian officers didn’t instantly affirm the assaults.
