Citing humanitarian reasons, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a temporary Easter ceasefire in Ukraine starting Saturday, as Russia and Ukraine swapped hundreds of captured soldiers in the largest exchange since Moscow’s full-scale invasion started over three years ago.
According to the Kremlin, the ceasefire will start Saturday at 6 p.m. Moscow time (11 a.m. ET) and end at midnight following Easter Sunday.
“We assume that the Ukrainian side will follow our example. At the same time, our troops must be ready to repel possible violations of the truce and provocations from the enemy, any of its aggressive actions,” Putin said at a meeting with Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov, in a video shared by the Kremlin’s Press Service.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called the ceasefire “another attempt by Putin to play with human lives.” He wrote on X that “air raid alerts are spreading across Ukraine,” and “Shahed drones in our skies reveal Putin’s true attitude toward Easter and toward human life.”
Russia had rejected full interim ceasefireÂ
In response to the ceasefire announcement, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Kyiv had in March “agreed unconditionally to the U.S. proposal of a full interim ceasefire for 30 days,” which Russia rejected.
“Putin has now made statements about his alleged readiness for a ceasefire. Thirty hours instead of 30 days,” Sybiha continued, writing on X. “Unfortunately, we have had a long history of his statements not matching his actions.”
The two sides, meanwhile, exchanged hundreds of POWs on Saturday. Russia’s Ministry of Defence said that 246 Russian service members were returned from territory controlled by Kyiv, and that “as a gesture of goodwill” 31 wounded Ukrainian POWs were transferred in exchange for 15 wounded Russian soldiers in need of urgent medical care.
Zelenskyy said that 277 Ukrainian “warriors” have returned home from Russian captivity.
Both sides thanked the United Arab Emirates for their mediation.
Putin’s ceasefire announcement came after U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday said negotiations between Ukraine and Russia are “coming to a head” and insisted that neither side is “playing” him in his push to end the grinding three-year war.
Trump spoke shortly after Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned that the U.S. may “move on” from trying to secure a Russia-Ukraine peace deal if there is no progress in the coming days, after months of efforts have failed to bring an end to the fighting.
U.S. President Donald Trump says the U.S. may ‘take a pass’ on brokering peace talks between Ukraine and Russia unless progress happens soon, but he hopes it doesn’t come to that. Russia has multiple ceasefire conditions that Ukraine refuses to meet.
ÂIn January 2023, Putin had ordered his forces in Ukraine to observe a unilateral, 36-hour ceasefire for Orthodox Christmas. Zelenskyy had dismissed it as playing for time to prepare additional attacks.
Russia fighting to retake all of Kursk region
Russia’s Defence Ministry said Saturday its forces pushed Ukrainian troops from the village of Oleshnya, one of their last remaining footholds in Russia’s Kursk region where the Ukrainians staged a surprise incursion last year.
Gerasimov said Saturday in a report to Putin, quoted by Russian state media, that Russia had retaken nearly all of the territory from Ukrainian forces.
“The main part of the region’s territory, where the invasion took place, has now been liberated. This is 1,260 square kilometres, 99.5 per cent,” Gerasimov said.
Zelenskyy wrote on X that Ukrainian forces “continued their activity on the territory of the Kursk region and are holding their positions.”
The Associated Press was unable to immediately verify the claim by Russia. Russian and North Korean soldiers have nearly deprived Kyiv of a key bargaining chip by retaking most of the region.
According to Russian state news agency Tass, Russia is still fighting to push Ukrainian forces out of the village of Gornal, some 11 kilometers south of Oleshnya.
“The Russian military has yet to push the Ukrainian armed forces out of Gornal … in order to completely liberate the Kursk region. Fierce fighting is underway in the settlement,” the agency reported, citing Russia security agencies.
In other developments, the Ukrainian air force reported that Russia fired 87 exploding drones and decoys in the latest wave of attacks overnight into Saturday. It said 33 of them were intercepted and another 36 were lost, likely having been electronically jammed.
Russian attacks damaged farms in the Odesa region and sparked fires in the Sumy region overnight, Ukraine’s State Emergency Service said Saturday. Fires were contained, and no casualties were reported.
Russia’s Ministry of Defence, meanwhile, said its air defense systems shot down two Ukrainian drones overnight into Saturday.
