Photo: Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War on Telegram
Ukraine and Russia carried out another repatriation operation on Saturday, May 16, during which Ukraine recovered the bodies of 528 fallen individuals believed by the Russian side to be Ukrainian servicemen, according to the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War.
Investigators and forensic experts will now work to identify the bodies.
The Coordination Headquarters thanked the International Committee of the Red Cross for assisting with the repatriation process.
The operation comes amid a new prisoner exchange agreement between Ukraine and Russia in the “1000 for 1000” format. A day earlier, Ukraine secured the return of 205 military personnel and four civilians from Russian captivity, including 20 fighters from the Azov Brigade.
Ukraine’s Human Rights Commissioner Dmytro Lubinets previously stated that defenders of Mariupol remain among the most difficult prisoners to bring back from Russian captivity.
