By Vladimir Soldatkin, Tom Balmforth and Huseyin Hayatsever
Russia and Ukraine said they had agreed at peace talks on Monday to exchange more prisoners of war and return the bodies of 12,000 dead soldiers.
The warring sides met for barely an hour in the Turkish city of Istanbul, for only the second such round of negotiations since March 2022.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan described it as a great meeting and said he hoped to bring together Russia’s Vladimir Putin and Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskiy for a meeting in Turkey with U.S. President Donald Trump.
But there was no breakthrough on a proposed ceasefire that Ukraine, its European allies and Washington have all urged Russia to accept.
Moscow says it seeks a long-term settlement, not a pause in the war; Kyiv says Putin is not interested in peace.
Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky said Russian negotiators had handed their Ukrainian counterparts a detailed memorandum outlining Moscow’s terms
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