Russia returns 1,000 bodies claimed to be Ukrainian service members
Ukraine received 1,000 bodies on October 23, 2025, which Russia claims are those of Ukrainian service members.
Ukraine’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War said authorities will conduct all necessary examinations and identification procedures of the recovered bodies in the coming days.
This year, the Russian side has transferred the bodies of its own fighters under the guise of Ukrainian defenders.
The retrieval of the bodies was made possible through the cooperation of various agencies. The headquarters extended its gratitude to all those involved, especially the service members who transported the deceased to specialized state institutions and transferred them to representatives of law enforcement and forensic medical examination.
By way of background, on August 19, Ukraine also received 1,000 bodies that Russia claimed were those of Ukrainian service members.
The identities of those killed in Ukraine are now being established in over 30 laboratories, compared with only five at the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion.
The full-scale war has acutely highlighted the issue of identifying the dead; for instance, the identities of three men from the Kyiv region who were abducted by Russians in 2022 and tortured to death in captivity were established solely through DNA analysis. Additionally, the DNA of over 50 bodies of Ukrainian service members — likely those killed in the Il-76 crash —matched DNA samples.
