During the full-scale war, during a series of exchanges with Russia, Ukraine received more than 400 bodies of Ukrainian defenders. Most of them were killed at Azovstal.
This was reported to Suspilne by the Commissioner for Missing Persons Oleh Kotenko.
The bodies of the soldiers are sent to the morgues of Kyiv, Dnipro and Kharkiv. There are plans to add another morgue — in Zaporizhzhia. Kotenko asks the relatives of the deceased to take DNA tests so that it would be possible to establish the identity of the deceased. Relatives can take the test in any city in the country, the results are entered into a single database.
"If we now take the majority of people not from Azovstal, there will be more cases where there is a body, but DNA has not been submitted. Therefore, when I conduct negotiations, there is an agreement with Russia to write at least about where the body is coming from — is it the Luhansk direction, Volnovakha or is it the Kharkiv direction, etc. Because there are a lot of bodies without documents, we donʼt know who they are," Kotenko said.
- On July 11, Kotenko reported that approximately 7,200 servicemen of the Armed Forces, the Security Service, National Guardsmen and border guards are considered missing. Most of them are in captivity.
- Civilians, activists, mayors, etc. are also held captive by the Russians. According to the Association of Cities of Ukraine, at least 8 heads of cities, villages and towns from the Zaporizhzhia, Kherson and Kharkiv oblasts are being held captive by the Russians.
- The UN has evidence of 270 cases of abduction of Ukrainian civilians by the Russian military.