Ukrainian authorities this Saturday announced the release of 116 soldiers and members of their country’s security forces, in a group that includes “defenders” of Mariupol, Gerson and Bakhmut, while Russia announced the release of 63 soldiers.
“We managed to give back to our people, our heroes,” the president’s chief of staff Andriy Yermak announced through his account on the Telegram social network.
According to the same source, in this groupthere are 87 soldiers of the armed forcesthe rest are members of the national police, border guard and emergency services.
Along with the release of these soldiers, the bodies of two dead foreign volunteers, identified as Briton Christopher Matthew Perry and New Zealander Andrew Tobias Matthew, were returned to Ukraine.
Also among the lifeless bodies is the return of a Ukrainian who served in the French Foreign Legion, identified as Yevgeny Olegovich Kulik.
The Russian Ministry of Defense had already announced the exchange of 63 Russian prisoners of war. for the second time this year, thanks to the mediation efforts of the UAE, without saying how many Ukrainian troops have been sent to Kiev.
In this “special exchange” announced this Saturday by Moscow and Kiev, there are a total of 179 prisoners of war, among the 63 Russian soldiers are some of “excellent importance” who are already back in Russian-controlled territory.
“As a result of a complicated negotiation process, 63 soldiers of the Russian Armed Forces have returned from regime-controlled areas in Kiev,” he announced in a statement.
According to the defense ministry, “at this time all soldiers are on Russian territory” and “have been offered necessary psychological and medical assistance, in addition to the opportunity to communicate with their families”.
“The group of released Russian military personnel includes people of the ‘sensitive category’, whose exchange was made possible thanks to the mediation efforts of the UAE authorities,” the ministry said, without giving further details.
On Wednesday, Russia’s ombudsman, Tatiana Moskalkova, accused the Ukrainian side of applying double standards to the prisoner exchange process by prioritizing “media figures” and crossing out regular soldiers and non-commissioned officers.
“For the Ukrainian authorities, political advantage is above piety and humanism,” denounced the provider, pointing out that it affects “the effectiveness of exchanges.”
In this sense, the Russian ombudsman added that the exchange process is taking longer, which affects the seriously injured soldiers.
According to a statement by the Russian news agency TASS, the Defense Ministry thanked the UAE for its mediation efforts to facilitate the prisoner exchange.
Source: DN
