Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has stated that the number of Ukrainian soldiers killed on the battlefield during the four-year war with Russia is around 55.
Zelensky announced the figure in an interview with France 2 television on Wednesday. He added that a large number of people are officially considered missing.
While both Kiev and Moscow have regularly published estimates of the other side’s losses, they have been reluctant to provide details on their own losses.
US President Donald Trump has led efforts to end the war that began with Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbor on February 22, 2022.
US special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, are holding talks with Russian and Ukrainian negotiators in the United Arab Emirates capital, Abu Dhabi, for a second day in a row this Thursday, in an attempt to detail the peace agreement proposed by the US.
This is the second trilateral meeting of this kind and the talks, according to Witkoff, had been “detailed and productive”, but he added that “much work remains”.
The most difficult issue is territory, with Russia demanding that Ukraine hand over the rest of the eastern industrial region of Donbas that Moscow does not currently control.
Trump often says that thousands of Ukrainians and Russians die needlessly every week. Western intelligence agencies also publish estimates that are impossible to verify.
The last time Zelensky gave an update on Ukraine’s casualties was in December 2024, when he put the death toll at 43.
In his interview with French television, he said: “In Ukraine, officially the number of soldiers killed on the battlefield, whether professional or conscripted, is 55.”
The official death toll cited by Zelensky is significantly lower than Ukraine’s total losses. As he himself said, “a large number of people” have been registered as missing.
As early as six months ago, the Ukrainian interior ministry had registered over 70 people as officially missing (both soldiers and civilians), but the exact breakdown is never given.
The true figure may be higher, while information on the number of deaths is very sensitive and affects the morale of the population.
Throughout Ukraine, military graves are visible in every cemetery, marked with blue and yellow national flags. They often have an image of a soldier in uniform carved into the tombstone.
There are still mothers searching for their sons who never returned from battle. Often, they cling to the hope that their men are prisoners of war, captured and held somewhere in Russia, but not on any official list.
Access to Russian prisons for organizations like the Red Cross is very limited.
The alternative is that the missing men were killed and their bodies have not been recovered from territories now controlled by Russia, or that their remains have not yet been identified through DNA testing.
From time to time, the two countries organize troop exchanges (apart from the exchange of prisoners of war) but there has been nothing since last August.
Another prisoner exchange agreement was reached at the Abu Dhabi talks, Witkoff reported. It involved the exchange of 314 prisoners, “the first such exchange in five months,” he said.
“While much work remains, such steps show that continued diplomatic engagement is bringing concrete results and advancing efforts to end the war in Ukraine,” Witkoff added, quoted by the BBC.
The talks began as Russia resumed attacks on Ukraine after a week-long pause that Trump had asked Vladimir Putin to respect, while a bitter cold gripped Ukraine.
The attacks have targeted the country’s energy sector, leaving thousands without electricity and heating, while temperatures dropped to -20°C (-4°F).
