KYIV: Kyiv said on Thursday that it had received from Russia 1,000 remains of people that Moscow said were Ukrainian soldiers killed fighting the Kremlin’s army.

The exchange of prisoners of war and the remains of killed soldiers is one of the few remaining areas of cooperation between Kyiv and Moscow, which invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

“Today, repatriation measures took place, under which 1,000 bodies of the deceased, which the Russian side claims belong to Ukrainian defenders, were returned to Ukraine,” Kyiv’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, said in a statement on social media.

Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky confirmed an exchange had taken place, writing on Telegram that the Russian side had received the remains of 38 killed Russian soldiers.

Attacks leave six more dead

Medinsky said the exchange was made possible as part of agreements struck between Ukrainian and Russian delegations in Istanbul earlier last year.

Tens of thousands of soldiers have been killed on both sides since Russia invaded, though neither side regularly publishes data on their own casualties.

Attacks kill six

Russian attacks killed six people in central and southern Ukraine on Thursday, regional authorities and emergency services said.

The attacks come as Ukraine grapples with its toughest winter since the start of the war, with Russian strikes cutting heating and power to millions as temperatures linger well below freezing point.

In Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia region, “Russian shelling killed a 62-year-old man and women aged 26 and 50,” Ukraine’s state emergency service said.

In the neighbouring Kherson region, Russian bombardment killed a 46-year-old man and a 39-year-old woman, according to regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin.

A Russian attack on Kryvyi Rig, President Volodymyr Zelensky’s hometown, killed one elderly woman, the head of the city’s administration said.

Diplomatic efforts to end the nearly four-year war have accelerated in recent weeks, though both sides remain at odds over the key issue of territorial control once the war ends. The next talks are expected to take place in Abu Dhabi on Sunday.

Putin meets UAE president

Russian President Vladimir Putin met Emirati counterpart Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan in Moscow on Thursday ahead of a second round of talks on the Ukraine war in Abu Dhabi.

The UAE has emerged as a key mediator in the nearly four-year war, brokering a number of prisoner exchanges between the two sides and most recently hosting talks between US, Russian and Ukrainian officials on a US-drafted plan to end the fighting.

A follow-up meeting is planned for Sunday, though it is not clear whether US officials will attend. “I would like to commend the Emirati side’s efforts in the context of the Ukrainian crisis, their contribution to prisoner exchanges, and assistance in organising contacts in the United Arab Emirates,” Putin said in a televised meeting with Al Nahyan.

Published in Dawn, January 30th, 2026