U.S. President Donald Trump's special envoys, Steve Witkoff and Keith Kellogg, will travel to Istanbul for possible peace talks between Ukraine and Russia, Reuters reported on May 13, citing three undisclosed sources.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said he will meet with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara, but said both leaders are ready to fly to Istanbul if Russian President Vladimir Putin chooses to attend the talks there.
A captive named Umit allegedly agreed to serve in the Russian army in exchange for Russian citizenship and a monetary reward of 2 million rubles ($25,000).
Russia's Buryatia Republic declared a state of emergency on May 13 over massive forest fires that have engulfed multiple regions in the Russian Far East.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko's statement came as Strong Shield 5 exercises involving military personnel from other NATO countries began in Lithuania.
"Amendments to the Budget Code are needed to implement the provisions on funding the U.S.-Ukrainian Reconstruction Investment Fund," lawmaker Roksolana Pidlasa said.
During reconnaissance in an unspecified front-line sector, Special Operations Forces' operators detected Buk-M3 and Uragan-1 on combat duty, the unit said.
The suspect quit his job at the Rivne NPP before the full-scale war began. In the spring of 2025, a GRU liaison contacted him and offered cooperation in exchange for money.
Ukrainian military intelligence (HUR) chief Kyrylo Budanov during a meeting with the relatives of Ukrainian prisoners of war who Russia claims were on the Il-76 transport plane that crashed over Russia's Belgorod Oblast, on Jan. 26, 2024. (Ukraine’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War/Facebook)
Ukraine’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War said on Jan. 26 that during the planned exchange of POWs two days earlier Moscow was to return to Ukraine 65 people from one of the lists Russian propagandists shared after the crash of Il-76 transport plane in Russia's Belgorod Oblast.
The confirmation came after Russian propagandist Margarita Simonyan published a list of Ukrainian POWs who were allegedly on board the aircraft on Jan. 24. The headquarters did not specify whether this was the mentioned list.
According to the Headquarters Secretary, Dmytro Usov, after Ukraine’s repeated requests to share the list of POWs Russia claims were on the plane, Moscow responded, referring to one of the lists previously published on Russian propaganda sources.
On Jan. 26, Usov, Ukrainian military intelligence (HUR) chief Kyrylo Budanov, and other military and law enforcement officials met with the relatives of the prisoners of war mentioned in the list. After watching the videos allegedly from the crash site published by Russian propagandа sources, family members "did not see any special signs on the body fragments that would indicate that these are their relatives."
"We are collecting and thoroughly analyzing all available information on this matter from many sources. So far, no information indicates that the plane could have carried that many people,” Budanov noted.
He said that Moscow’s version that 65 Ukrainian POWs could have been on the board of the Il-76 for the exchange "still raises many questions."
The day earlier, Ukraine's Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said Russia’s list included prisoners of war who had already been swapped before.
Representatives of the headquarters promised that they would inform the relatives about the POWs’ fate as soon as they have reliable information.
Ukraine's military intelligence confirmed that a prisoner exchange had been planned for Jan. 24 but added that the Russian side had not informed the Ukrainian side about the need to ensure airspace safety over Belgorod before the plane crash.
HUR’s spokesperson Andrii Yusov said Moscow has not passed on information about the Russian Il-76 transport plane crash to the International Committee of Red Cross yet for an investigation.
Kateryna Denisova works as a News Editor at the Kyiv Independent. She previously worked as a news editor at the NV media outlet for four years, covering mainly Ukrainian and international politics. Kateryna holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Taras Shevchenko University of Kyiv. She also was a fellow at journalism schools in the Czech Republic and Germany.
The Kyiv Independent news desk
