Ukraine receives 501 bodies said by Russia to be those of fallen Ukrainian soldiers
Ukraine has received 501 bodies of the dead that, according to the Russian side, may belong to Ukrainian service members, Ukraine’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War said.
Investigators and forensic experts will now carry out the examinations needed to identify the remains.
The verification is necessary because there have been previous cases in which Russia attempted to transfer the bodies of its own citizens along with the bodies of fallen Ukrainian soldiers during exchanges. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said that Russia at times hands over the bodies of its own citizens together with Russian passports. He said he believes Russia does this deliberately, including to make its own losses appear smaller.
“The repatriation measures were carried out as a result of the joint work of representatives of the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, the Joint Center under the Security Service of Ukraine, the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, the Office of the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights, the Secretariat of the Commissioner for Missing Persons Under Special Circumstances, the State Emergency Service of Ukraine, and other structures of Ukraine’s security and defense sector,” the headquarters said.
The Coordination Headquarters also thanked the International Committee of the Red Cross for its assistance and support in carrying out the repatriation effort.