Russian forces regularly shell the area and snipers hide in the trees on the edge of the fields observing the exchange. At the border, forensic scientists from the International Committee of the Red Cross carried out a spot check on the bodies. The corpse-carrying vans then crossed into Russian territory to meet their counterparts, with Ukrainian rescue workers, members of Ukraine’s security services and representatives from the ICRC in tow.The repatriation of dead Ukrainian soldiers from areas now occupied by Russia is part of a huge effort by several Ukrainian state agencies to find and identify some of the 24,000-plus registered missing Ukrainian soldiers and thereby give some closure to their loved ones. Under the Geneva Conventions dead bodies and prisoners of war are meant to be exchanged only after the war. But in the Russia-Ukraine war, exchanges of both started in earnest after the first six months. Is the war creating destroying Ukraine for generations ?

