175 Russian servicemen have been swapped for 175 Ukrainians, with seven civilian captives from Kursk also released, the Defense Ministry in Moscow has said

Russia and Ukraine have conducted a POW swap involving 350 captives, the Defense Ministry in Moscow said on Saturday, a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a temporary ceasefire for the Orthodox Easter weekend.

In a press release, the Russian MOD said that "175 Russian service members were returned from territory controlled by the Kiev regime, while in exchange, 175 Ukrainian Armed Forces prisoners of war were handed over." The ministry added that separately, seven civilians from Kursk Region - said to have been the last hostages still held from the Ukrainian incursion last year - were released and will soon return home.

According to the ministry, the Russian servicemen are currently in neighboring Belarus, where they are receiving psychological and medical assistance before being transported to Russia for treatment and rehabilitation.

Since the resumption of direct Russia-Ukraine talks in May 2025, the sides have regularly carried out exchanges of POWs as well as of the bodies of fallen troops. The previous exchange occurred on April 3, when the sides swapped 600 captives.

Saturday's exchange took place just hours before the Easter ceasefire came into effect. The Russian military has been ordered to halt all operations against Ukrainian forces from 16:00 Moscow time (13:00 GMT) on Saturday until the end of Sunday. While the Kremlin noted that troops should remain ready to respond to any Ukrainian offensive operations or provocations, it said "we expect the Ukrainian side to follow Russia's lead" and halt operations to observe a holiday that is observed in both countries.

Moscow has previously declared unilateral pauses during Orthodox holidays, but last year's Easter truce was only partially successful: Kiev violated the truce more than 3,900 times, according to the Russian MOD. This time, Ukraine's Vladimir Zelensky pledged to "observe a ceasefire regime" and "act exclusively in a mirror manner."

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Moscow and Kiev held several rounds of direct bilateral talks and trilateral meetings involving the US over the past year, but the peace process has recently stalled due to the US-Israeli war on Iran, though channels for humanitarian issues and prisoner swaps remain open.