Russia Accuses Ukraine of Refusing Ceasefire for Soldier Body Handover

Russia’s Defence Ministry is accusing Ukraine of refusing to halt ⁠the shelling ⁠of the eastern city of Kostiantynivka to allow Moscow to hand over the bodies of ⁠fallen Ukrainian soldiers.

The ministry said on Sunday that it had proposed ⁠a six-hour ceasefire in and around Kostiantynivka on ⁠Monday to facilitate ⁠the handover and had given Kyiv until 0900 GMT on Sunday ‌to respond.

The Russian claim is the latest salvo in the verbal battle over Kostiantynivka. Russia said on Friday that its forces had taken control of the city, a target Moscow has long sought in its advance through the Donetsk region.

Ukraine denied the city had fallen, saying its forces remained in control.

“Of course, that is not true,” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on X about the claim that Russian forces now controlled the city. “It is just another Russian lie, an attempt to generate some kind of a news story.”

“If Kostiantynivka were under Russian control, then perhaps Putin would have no problem meeting me there to find a diplomatic way to finally end this war,” he added.

On Russian radio, Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, mocked Zelenskyy’s suggested meeting, saying Kostiantynivka was already a part of Russia and the Kremlin’s invitation for Zelenskyy to meet President Vladimir Putin in Moscow still stood.

Zelenskyy last month wrote to Putin seeking face-to-face talks as a step towards peace, but has long rejected any meeting in the Russian capital.

Elsewhere, one person was killed in a Ukrainian attack on Russian-occupied Crimea, Russian officials said in the early hours of Sunday. Two others were injured in the attack, including one in a serious condition, the Kremlin-installed regional Governor Sergei Aksyonov wrote on Telegram without giving details.

The latest attacks came after Zelenskyy and Putin spoke with Donald Trump on ending the war, now in its fifth year.

The US president offered to help Putin find a solution to the war, Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov said. Trump made the offer during a nearly 90-minute phone call on Saturday to discuss the war ahead of a NATO summit in Ankara, Ushakov added.

Zelenskyy also spoke to Trump on Saturday and said they had discussed the war’s 1,200km (745 miles) front line.

“There is a real prospect to end this war and American resolve will have a crucial meaning,” he wrote on Telegram. He said they agreed to continue talks at the NATO summit this week.

A senior US official confirmed that Trump would meet Zelenskyy on Wednesday to discuss “how we can end the war”.

“The battlefield ⁠has clearly frozen over the last couple of months and neither ⁠side is making a ⁠lot of progress,” the official said. “The president feels a real sense of urgency to try to bring this to a ‌stop.”