Russia, Ukraine to swap dead and wounded, no ceasefire

Istanbul

Representatives of Russia and Ukraine met Monday for their second round of direct peace talks in just over two weeks, but aside from agreeing to swap thousands of their dead and seriously wounded troops, they made no progress toward ending the 3-year-old war, officials said.

The talks unfolded a day after a string of stunning long-range attacks by both sides, with Ukraine launching a devastating drone assault on Russian air bases and Russia hurling its largest drone attack of the war against Ukraine.

At the negotiating table, Russia presented a memorandum setting out the Kremlin's terms for ending hostilities, the Ukrainian delegation said.

Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, who led the Ukrainian delegation, told reporters that Kyiv officials would need a week to review the document and decide on a response. Ukraine proposed further talks on a date between 20 June and 30 June, he said.

After the talks, Russian state news agencies Tass and RIA Novosti published the text of the Russian memorandum, which suggested that Ukraine withdraw its forces from the four regions that Russia annexed in September 2022 but never fully captured as a condition for a ceasefire.

As an alternate way of reaching a truce, the memorandum presses Ukraine to halt its mobilisation efforts and freeze Western arms deliveries, conditions were suggested earlier by Russian President Vladimir Putin. The document also suggests that Ukraine stop any redeployment of forces and ban any military presence of third countries on its soil as conditions for halting hostilities.