Washington — President Trump said Friday that Russia and Ukraine had carried out a large exchange of prisoners from their more than three-year war, while a Ukrainian official said the swap was ongoing but not yet complete. Moscow did not immediately confirm the exchange was underway but it appeared to be one of the few signs of any progress in international efforts to halt the fighting.
“A major prisoners swap was just completed between Russia and Ukraine,” Mr. Trump said on his Truth Social platform. He said it would “go into effect shortly,” although it was not clear what that meant.
A senior Ukrainian official familiar with the details of the swap told The Associated Press that the exchange was ongoing Friday morning but had not finished. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly.
Both Russian and Ukrainian media outlets reported in recent days that a swap was agreed for about 1,000 prisoners to be handed over by each side but no specifics were confirmed by either government on Friday.
Shamsail Saraliev, a senior Russian lawmaker and representative of the parliamentary coordination group on military operations, told the country’s RBC news agency on Thursday that it would be difficult to conduct a prisoner exchange with Ukraine involving as many as 2,000 prisoners in total in just one day, saying the process would likely be carried out over several days.
“This could lead to something big???” Mr. Trump said in his post on Friday, apparently referring to international diplomatic efforts to stop the fighting. White House and National Security Council officials did not immediately respond to requests for further details.
Pavlo Palamarchuk/REUTERS 
Speaking Friday at the Kremlin, spokesman Dmitry Peskov said there had been “no decisions or agreements yet on the next venue for negotiations between Russia and Ukraine.”
The ongoing exchange was agreed last week in the first direct Russia-Ukraine peace talks since the early weeks of Moscow’s 2022 invasion of its neighbor. That meeting in Turkey lasted just two hours and brought no breakthrough in international diplomatic efforts to stop the fighting.
Still, the fact that the two sides had even sat down face-to-face on May 15 was a significant development in itself, even though Russian President Vladimir Putin declined to accept his Ukrainian counterpart, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s, challenge to show up for the negotiations in person.
Several days later, Mr. Trump held a two-hour phone call with Putin, the tone and spirit of which he described as “excellent.” He said Russia and Ukraine would “immediately start negotiations toward a ceasefire,” and he then held a separate call with Zelenskyy.
Mr. Trump said repeatedly before taking office for his second term that he could bring the Russia-Ukraine war to an end within 24 hours.
