Russia says Ukraine agrees in principle to new large-scale prisoner swap

The detail that this came out of trilateral talks with the United States, rather than a bilateral channel, is the part that carries weight: it suggests Washington is still functioning as a convening party even as the wider conflict grinds on. Medinsky's separate remark that the Russian delegation had no contact with European representatives in Abu Dhabi is a quieter signal, pointing to a format where Europe is absent from the room. Whether prisoner exchanges remain the one area where these channels produce results, and whether the European exclusion persists, are the open questions worth watching.