"Lost, but not forgotten": How Ukraine is searching for the war's missing

"Hello, Mom. Everything is fine. I'll be offline, maybe for a long time, maybe a week or a month. Don't worry."

This was the last message Nazar Ocheretnyi sent to his mother, on March 30, 2022.

Nearly three years later, he still hasn't been in touch.

The Ukrainian combat medic disappeared at the age of 33 in Mariupol, the eastern Ukrainian city that was then under siege in one of the bloodiest chapters in the Russian war against Ukraine.

On April 12, 2022, Ocheretnyi's mother, Valentyna Ocheretnaya, was officially informed that her son was missing in action, "possibly captured."

And despite the tireless search of his 61-year-old mother, as of March 2025, he has remained "neither dead nor known to be alive."

It is known that Ocheretnyi is one of almost 60,000 military and civilian personnel recognized as missing in special circumstances in the government's Unified Register.

However, the real number could be much higher.

“If the person is on the register – there are two main versions – the person is either in Russian captivity, or he is dead,” said Artur Dobroserdov, the Commissioner for Missing Persons in Special Circumstances.

But the longer the war continues, the harder it is for the Ukrainian government to find those who were captured or killed.

The way war is waged has also changed since 2022.

Both militaries now make extensive use of drones, so returning troops from the front lines is increasingly difficult – which is why Russia and Ukraine regularly exchange troops.

Ukraine has managed to bring home more than 7,000 troops since Russia launched its aggression in February 2022.

Mandatory DNA test

During the last such repatriation, on February 14, Ukraine brought home the bodies of 757 fallen soldiers.

But for their relatives, it was not yet the moment when they could finally bury their loved one according to Ukrainian traditions.

"I'll tell you the bitter truth. You still have to be lucky to find your loved one and bury him," reads a comment on social media in a discussion about soldiers who are missing in action.

Identifying missing persons is a long and complex process.

“Often, what comes back is just the remains of bodies,” Dobroserdov said – “mutilated, dismembered, rotting or burned.”

"The most difficult thing for an expert is when a package arrives and it contains a large number of body fragments. When you open it, you don't understand whether it belongs to one person or 10 to 20 people," says Ruslan Abbasov, deputy director of the State Center for Forensic Science Research.

Experts say that sometimes, but not often, bodies are returned with clues to their identity.

However, this information needs to be checked.

There have been cases where a body has been given one name, but after DNA testing it turned out to belong to a completely different person.

Even if relatives recognize a fallen soldier, a DNA test is still mandatory for final identification.

“This is especially essential in repatriation exchanges,” Dobroserdov says.

“We take a DNA sample from every part of the body and create a DNA profile. We release the body only after we have examined everyone from this repatriation. Because you can’t make an identification order, bury one person and then find some other remains after a while,” Dobroserdov explained, adding that there have been cases in which the remains of one body have been handed over during different repatriations at different times.

In cases where the missing person has no next of kin, experts also analyze the things they left behind – especially items that were in direct contact with their skin – to search for a DNA match.

Facial reconstruction techniques

It is reported that to speed up the search, Ukrainian authorities are turning to advanced technologies, writes CNN, the Telegraph reports.

On February 20, the National Police of Ukraine posted computer-generated images on social media of five unidentified men who were killed in action.

"If you know any of your relatives or friends who have disappeared due to the war or know people who are looking for them, please contact us," the message says.

It was the first time that Ukrainians had used 3D reconstruction techniques for this purpose.

"We are testing technology for restoring facial features of unidentified bodies based on the shape of the skull and available genomic information," said Khrystyna Podyriako, head of the National Police's war crimes investigation department.

This allows for the restoration of distinguishing features such as hair and skin color, facial shape, and approximate age.

Ukrainians also use facial recognition software provided by Western partners and conduct searches in databases, social networks, and the Internet.

One tool used is the Clearview AI app, which allows users to recognize faces from photos posted on social media and has enabled researchers to identify missing soldiers who are in captivity.

According to Dobroserdov, Russia does not always keep accurate lists of prisoners of war, which means that Ukrainians have to find and confirm the identities of many of those being held captive.

CNN has had rare access to one of the facial recognition facilities in Kiev, where a four-person team searches for images of any captured soldiers appearing on Russian Telegram channels or media outlets and attempts to identify them.

Such work requires special attention to detail; dozens of photos of soldiers are on computer screens. If the team finds something, it notifies the soldier's family that their loved one is likely in captivity.

"Give me back my son"

In support of the government's efforts, Ukrainians are joining so-called "armies of families," searching Russian TV channels, social media, and news videos for signs of the missing.

Families often conduct their own investigations as well.

Ocheretnaya received information from at least three different people that her son had been seen in captivity in Russia.

"Everything matches what eyewitnesses say. They recognized him from his photo, his marks, they told me where and what tattoos he had. One boy said that Nazar bandaged him for two weeks after the Russians burned his arm where the Ukrainian emblem was," Ocheretnaya said.

She learned of three places where Ocheretnyi was likely seen: in the Volgograd and Sakha regions of Russia, and in Olenivka prison in the Russian-occupied Donetsk region.

She provided all the information she had gathered to the Ukrainian authorities and the International Committee of the Red Cross.

But her son is not on any official Russian list.

Ocheretnaya also provided her DNA, but the database found no match.

"It means he's alive; I know him. Maybe he's in a prison where they haven't released the prisoners yet, so his name is nowhere to be found," she hopes.

Over the past three years, Ocheretnaya has attended many meetings held by relatives of those missing in action and has joined almost every group where they speak.

She has contacted everyone from Ocheretny's brigade and is still looking for him everywhere.

"I have an old video of him, in which he is driving, joking and laughing with other guys. I watch this video several times a day. I know every second, every turn of the eye, every movement of the hand," Ocheretnaya said.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has repeatedly said that Ukraine is ready for an "all-for-all" exchange.

The release of all Ukrainian prisoners held by Russia would be a good step towards peace.

This is exactly what Ocheretnaya, like thousands of other Ukrainian families, expects.

"I'm really asking God to give me my son back. I don't need anything else. Just to get him back," she continued. /Telegraph/