Ukraine announced on Friday that it had received the remains of 563 soldiers who had died in action, mainly in the eastern Donetsk area. The handover, facilitated by Russian authorities, marked one of the largest exchanges of fallen soldiers since the beginning of the ongoing conflict.
Despite the ongoing tensions, the process of exchanging both prisoners and bodies has remained one of the few areas of communication between Kyiv and Moscow since the Russian invasion in 2022. In a statement shared on social media, the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War confirmed, “The bodies of 563 Ukrainian defenders were returned to Ukraine.”
Of these, 320 remains came from the Donetsk region, with 89 soldiers reported to have fallen near Bakhmut—a town captured by Russian forces last May following a fierce battle. An additional 154 bodies were transported from morgues within Russia.
To date, neither side has disclosed the full toll of military personnel lost in the ongoing fighting.
