On Friday, as the Kyiv city government declared a day of mourning for 24 civilians killed in a devastating Russian missile strike, Russia and Ukraine carried out the first phase of a planned large-scale prisoner of war exchange, freeing 205 captives from each side. This dual development underscores the stark contradiction that continues to define the 2022 full-scale invasion: fleeting diplomatic progress toward de-escalation is consistently overshadowed by mounting civilian casualties and escalating military hostilities.
Hours before the POW transfer, Ukrainian rescue workers concluded a 28-hour search operation through the rubble of a nine-story residential apartment block in Kyiv’s southeastern Darnytskyi district, which was reduced to ruin by a Russian X-101 cruise missile attack launched Thursday. The strike completely destroyed 18 apartments and killed 24 people, among them three teenage girls – 12-year-old Lyubava Yakovleva, whose father had already been killed earlier in the war, and two 15-year-old girls. Lyubava’s older sister was initially reported missing before her death was confirmed, adding another layer of grief to the tragedy. Other fatalities included two postal workers, a kindergarten teacher, an English language instructor, and a former professional hockey player.
First responders and civilian volunteers, including 18-year-old Ivan who rushed to the site with his father, described chaotic scenes of smoke and fire as they pulled survivors from the debris. Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko confirmed that 30 people were rescued from the rubble. A day of mourning was held across Kyiv on Friday, and President Volodymyr Zelensky joined crowds of mourners laying flowers at the site of the destroyed building. Zelensky emphasized that the missile used in the attack had been manufactured in recent weeks, arguing that this proves Russia continues to evade international sanctions to import critical components for weapons production. “Russia deliberately destroys lives and hopes to remain unpunished,” Zelensky said, calling for increased international pressure on Moscow.
Parallel to the mourning in Kyiv, Russian officials reported that a Ukrainian drone attack on the city of Ryazan, located southeast of Moscow, killed four people including one child and injured 28 more. Governor Pavel Malkov said debris from downed drones damaged two residential apartment blocks, while a Ukrainian drone commander confirmed that the attack targeted Ryazan’s major oil refinery, one of the largest energy facilities in central Russia.
The POW exchange completed Friday marks the opening phase of a broader agreement to swap 1,000 prisoners from each side of the conflict, brokered jointly by the United States and the United Arab Emirates. Zelensky confirmed that most of the 205 released Ukrainian prisoners had been in Russian captivity since the early months of the full-scale invasion in 2022. Among those freed were fighters who defended the besieged port city of Mariupol, troops who held the Chornobyl nuclear plant in the opening weeks of the war, and service members from contested border regions. Russia’s defense ministry stated that the 205 released Russian prisoners have been transferred to Belarus for medical and psychological assessment.
The exchange was negotiated as part of a three-day ceasefire agreement between the two warring parties, which ran from May 9 to May 11, coinciding with Russia’s annual Victory Day holiday. The truce was marred by repeated violations from both sides from its start, and collapsed entirely earlier this week when Russian forces launched one of the largest combined drone and missile offensives of the entire war. Ukrainian defense officials reported that between May 13 and 14 alone, Russia launched 1,410 drones and 56 missiles targeting civilian and infrastructure sites across the country.
Despite Russian President Vladimir Putin’s recent comment that the war is “heading to an end,” no peace negotiations have been held between the two sides since February, and there is no visible indication of upcoming diplomatic progress. Ukrainian officials and political analysts have suggested the timing of the recent Russian escalation is intentional: it coincided with a planned visit by U.S. President Donald Trump to Beijing for talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping, and Zelensky accused Moscow of seeking to “disrupt the overall political atmosphere” ahead of the high-level meeting. The Kremlin has since announced that Putin will travel to China to meet with Xi “really soon” following Trump’s Beijing visit, with talks set to cover bilateral relations and pressing global issues.