ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
Officials from Russia and Ukraine met for a second round of peace negotiations in Istanbul today. The discussions come after a surprise Ukrainian drone attack on remote Russian airbases yesterday. We'll have more on the Ukrainian drone operation later in the program. First, to tell us more about these latest diplomatic efforts to end the war in Ukraine, NPR's Charles Maynes joins us from Moscow. Charles, did today's negotiations actually accomplish anything?
CHARLES MAYNES, BYLINE: Well, both sides were supposed to present their so-called memoranda. These are essentially written proposals outlining their vision for a future peace accord. That happened, but not without some gamesmanship from the Russian delegation, which refused to share a draft in advance of the meeting, which Kyiv, in fact, had done. Either way, these peace proposals didn't seem to get very far. The two sides only met for about an hour.
But you can't say this meeting was pointless, far from it. Ukraine's lead negotiator, Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, said the two sides agreed to a range of humanitarian exchanges, in effect building on a mass prisoner exchange that came out of the previous round of negotiations. Here's Umerov.
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RUSTEM UMEROV: We focused on those who are severely damaged, who are ill. We focused on the categories of the young people and on other categories and exchanges of the bodies of the people who died.
SHAPIRO: Well, if that's what the Ukrainian side said, did Russia confirm that the prisoner swaps will happen?
MAYNES: They did. Russia's lead negotiator, Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky, put more details on this. He announced that Russia agreed to return the remains of 6,000 Ukrainian soldiers. Medinsky suggested he didn't know if there were presumed Russian dead held by the Ukrainian side as well, but said Moscow would accept them, too, if so. Medinsky also announced an exchange of all prisoners in poor health and for all POWs under the age of 25. But it's not clear what that means. Let's remember that in Ukraine, the draft age is 25, though, of course, younger people have also joined in the fight.
SHAPIRO: Another issue that the Ukrainians said they intended to raise was children kidnapped in Ukraine by the Russian army and brought into Russia. Was there any progress on that?
MAYNES: Well, the Ukrainians brought the issue up, and Medinsky, the lead Russian negotiator, made something of a show of it.
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VLADIMIR MEDINSKY: (Speaking Russian).
MAYNES: So in front of reporters, Medinsky pulled out a list of more than 300 children he said Ukraine had presented to Russia that Kyiv wanted returned. But Medinsky went on to suggest Ukraine was amplifying the issue of missing children and vastly the numbers of them to garner sympathy in the West. Either the way, Medinsky said Russia would investigate and return any minors to families indeed seeking them.
SHAPIRO: These minor issues don't seem to address whether there will be an end to the war, something that Trump has been pushing for hard. What is the hold up?
MAYNES: Well, the problem is the Trump administration is finding out is that neither side is ready to accept where things stand right now on the frontlines. Russia, despite participating in these talks, has almost shown zero willingness to compromise. You know, it still essentially demands control over Ukraine and thinks its advantage on the battlefield means it can achieve it. Which is why these surprise drone attacks by Ukraine on Sunday on Russian air bases were important. You know, they seem time to show Russia and Trump that Ukraine still has plenty of fight left in it.
And given that, it was interesting to see one small, I suppose, compromise from the Russian delegation today. Medinsky said Russia had suggested staggered short-term ceasefires two or three days along the frontline, but maybe not for the reason you might think, not as a step towards peace. Medinsky described it as a question of sanitation in the hot summer months, so each side could collect the dead.
SHAPIRO: That is NPR's Charles Maynes reporting from Moscow. Thank you.
MAYNES: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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