The bodies of 503 fallen soldiers have been returned from Russia to Ukraine, according to the Ukrainian authority that coordinates the treatment of prisoners of war.
It is at least the fourth time since October that at least 500 fallen have been returned to Ukrainian soil, and shows what the war costs in human lives.
Most of the bodies come from the Donetsk region, the site of the heaviest fighting. The rest come from Luhansk, the Zaporizhzhia region and morgues in Russia.
The Kremlin claims that Russia has annexed the three aforementioned regions, but does not have full control over any of them.
According to President Volodymyr Zelensky, 43,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed and 370,000 wounded since Russia attacked Ukraine in February 2022.
