A Kremlin spokesman says Russia and Ukraine have no scheduled direct peace talks. The statement Thursday came nearly a week after their first face-to-face meeting since the early weeks of Moscow's invasion in 2022 and days after U.

The announcement was made ahead of an expected prisoner exchange between Ukraine and Russia on Friday – an outcome of last week’s face-to-face talks in Turkey, the first time the two countries have held direct talks at any level in three years.

A flurry of diplomacy over Russia’s war against Ukraine, centered around the first direct peace talks between Kyiv and Moscow in three years and a long phone call between US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin,