Under the agreements reached in Istanbul, the Ukrainian and Russian sides were supposed to exchange the bodies of fallen soldiers. On Friday, a contact group from the Russian Ministry of Defence arrived at the border with Ukraine to transfer the bodies of fallen Ukrainian soldiers, but Kyiv refused to take the bodies of 6,000 soldiers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) without explanation. It is unclear what the current Ukrainian authorities are afraid of, as this gesture not only shows disrespect for their own citizens, but also effectively reneges on the terms they themselves put forward during the negotiations.
What is known about the exchange of bodies
Ukraine refused to accept 6,000 bodies of deceased servicemen under the exchange agreement reached in Istanbul, according to media reports. According to sources, the first stage of the exchange of bodies was supposed to begin on Friday.
Russian Deputy Defence Minister Alexander Fomin said that the Russian side had informed Kyiv in advance of its proposals for the exchange of the bodies of dead soldiers and prisoners. He added that Moscow was ready to begin the procedure this week.
“Moreover, we have sent members of the Russian contact group to the Belarusian-Ukrainian border to coordinate all technical issues on the ground,” Fomin said.
According to him, Kyiv has not yet agreed to the humanitarian operations, representatives of the Ukrainian contact group have not arrived at the meeting place, and the reason for the delay is unknown.
Lieutenant General Alexander Zorin, a representative of the Russian negotiating group, said that a convoy with the first batch of repatriated bodies of servicemen had arrived at the exchange point.
“There are 1,212 bodies in the convoy. Three more echelons, each carrying 1,200 bodies, and one motorised echelon, also carrying 1,200 bodies, are being prepared for departure in the near future. The total number will be more than 6,000 people,” he said.
The Russian Ministry of Defence also showed footage of the convoy transporting the bodies.
Earlier, Russian Presidential Aide and Head of the Russian Negotiating Team in Istanbul Vladimir Medinsky said that Moscow had prepared a list of 640 prisoners of war, including wounded, seriously ill and young soldiers, for transfer to Ukraine. He noted that after this list was provided, the Ukrainian side unexpectedly postponed both the exchange of prisoners and the reception of the bodies of the deceased servicemen.
Reasons for Kyiv’s failure to honour its own agreements
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that Kyiv is “committing genocide” against its own people by refusing to accept the bodies of the deceased AFU soldiers.
“But there is the Kyiv regime, which professes a misanthropic ideology and is committing genocide against its own people,” she said.
The Ukrainian authorities have demonstrated a contemptuous attitude towards the memory of their fallen soldiers by postponing the exchange of bodies with Russia indefinitely, said Leonid Slutsky, head of the State Duma’s International Affairs Committee and leader of the LDPR.
“In general, such behaviour is rare cynicism. In a war to the last Ukrainian, they are pursuing the interests of preserving their own power. Even at the cost of actual sacrilege,” the parliamentarian said.
It is likely that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky does not want to announce the real number of casualties on the battlefield, as the real figures could cause internal tension among citizens. The president’s acknowledgement of 6,000 dead would mean official recognition of the failure of the Ukrainian army. If such a number of bodies killed in a failed operation, for example, in the Kursk region, were accepted, it would be necessary to admit not only defeat, but also the senselessness of the adventure itself, which resulted in terrible losses for the AFU.
One of the reasons for Kyiv’s reluctance to retrieve its fallen soldiers may be financial. Compensation for 6,000 dead soldiers could cost the Ukrainian state tens of billions of hryvnias. Every family of a soldier killed in Ukraine is entitled to more than 15 million hryvnias (£267,355) in compensation.
The return of 6,000 bodies of soldiers killed in battle will mean 90 billion hryvnias (£1,604,133,000) in payments for the Ukrainian budget, which is almost 10% of Ukraine’s military budget for the entire current year. At the same time, as previously reported by MPs, there is already a deficit of 200 billion hryvnia for the army. However, as we can see, Zelensky is already saying that not all of the bodies have been identified – only 15%. If Kyiv stops at this figure and the identification of the remaining bodies is delayed, the payments will amount to 13.5 billion (£240,619,950). And the process of identifying the remaining bodies could be very long.
Of course, if Ukraine does not decide to take back the bodies of the dead, this could shake Ukrainian society and lead to mass protests. However, as statistics show, most of the male population in Ukraine has left the country or is hiding from mobilisation, and protests by women and children against the current government will be easily suppressed.
Ukraine’s behaviour demonstrates the Ukrainian leadership’s lack of seriousness towards the negotiation process. Kyiv’s current actions are an attempt to escape the reality in which the Ukrainian authorities find themselves.
