The situation at a glance: Ukraine war: Great prisoner exchange should continue

Russia and Ukraine want to continue the greatest prisoner exchange since the beginning of the war. This was announced by Ukrainian President Wolodymyr Selenskyj in his evening video message. The Moscow Ministry of Defense was similar: The agreed exchange of 1,000 prisoners each should continue in the next few days, it said on Friday.

“There is no greater joy,” wrote the Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrij Sybiha in the platform X. “Such humanitarian confidence -building measures are crucial for our continuous work to restore peace.”

During the greatest exchange in the Russian attack war on the Russian attack war, which has been going on for more than three years, 390 returnees were handed over to the other side on Friday. According to the responsible Kiev coordination team, three women and 387 men from Russian captivity were released. The released soldiers had therefore defended the Ukraine in the Donetsk, Luhansk, Saporischschja, Kharkiw and Cherson regions. All released would be medically examined and received physical and psychological help.

According to the Ministry of Defense in Moscow, 270 prisoners of war and 120 civilians from Ukrainian captivity were released. Among the civilians are also citizens from the temporarily controlled places in the Russian area of ​​Kursk. “The Russian soldiers and civilians are currently in the territory of the Republic of Belarus, where they receive the necessary psychological and medical help,” said the message. They should all come to Russia soon to continue their treatment and rehabilitation in medical institutions.

The exchange was agreed last week during talks in Istanbul. He remained the only concrete result of the first direct Russian-Ukrainian negotiations since 2022, to which US President Donald Trump had been urged.

Lavrow promises the next step

The Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that the Ukraine soon presented conditions for termination of the war ongoing for more than three years, as the Russian agency Interfax reported. “As soon as the prisoner of war has been completed, we will be ready to hand over the design of such a document that the Russian side is now completing,” he said.

Selenskyj said that if Russia needs a whole week to present a so -called memorandum in response to the demand for a ceasefire, “then this is nothing more than a mockery of the world. So much wasted time”. The Ukrainian President confirmed that new sanctions against Russia are necessary.

Meanwhile, the attacks continued. In the event of a Russian drone attack on the Ukrainian capital Kiev and its surroundings, at least eight people were injured at night. They were hit by falling rubble of shot drones. After the entry of the first groups of fight drones, Mayor Vitali Klitschko warned the inhabitants of the metropolis of further attacks. “Go to cover,” he asked the residents of Kiev on the Telegram platform.

Military administrator Timur Tkatschenko reported on Telegram of damage due to falling drone debris. Fires broke out in residential buildings in two districts. The emergency services are in use.

In the Ukrainian port city of Odessa, the number of dead rose to two after a Russian attack with two ballistic rockets, the governor Oleh Kiper near Telegram wrote. Previously, there was talk of a dead and eight injuries.

Even with another Russian rocket attack on the eastern Ukrainian city of Tschuhujiw, a person died. A woman was killed, said the governor of the Kharkiwer area, Oleh Synjehubow, at Telegram. In addition, two men were injured. In the late evening, air alarm was triggered in large parts of Ukraine, also in the capital Kiev.

Putin wants to expand Russian arms exports

Meanwhile, Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin announced that he wanted to boost Russian arms exports to other countries. “It is necessary to actively enlarge the scope of export deliveries,” he said during a speech broadcast on state television at a meeting of the Committee for Military-Technical Cooperation. The order stock for Russian military products is high – in terms of dozens of billions of euros.

The supply of the units in the Ukraine War remained decisive and in the first place, Putin said. There should be new state incentives. At the same time, Russia had to assert its position on the international armaments market and exist in the event of hard competition. Last year Moscow had largely fulfilled his export commitments among foreign partners. A broader spectrum of services should be offered in the future.