Soldiers return home after years in captivity as Ukraine-Russia prisoner swap begins
A new prisoner swap between Ukraine and Russia has begun, officials in both countries said Monday, with Ukrainian soldiers who have spent nearly the entire duration of the war in captivity among those returning home.
The exchange, agreed last week during talks in Turkey, involves detained people under the age of 25, as well as those who are seriously wounded, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed on Telegram.
It follows a dispute at the weekend during which Moscow accused Ukraine of holding up the exchange — a claim that Kyiv denied.
'Our people are home,' Zelensky wrote. 'Ukrainians are returning home from Russian captivity. The exchange began today and will continue in several stages over the next few days.'
Among those being released are Ukrainian soldiers who defended the city of Mariupol, which suffered a brutal Russian assault in the first few weeks of the war, the Ukraine Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War said.
The vast majority of those being released have been in captivity since 2022, according to Dmytro Lubinets, Ukraine's parliamentary commissioner for human rights.
Russia's Ministry of Defense also confirmed that the exchange is underway. 'The Russian servicemen are currently in the Republic of Belarus, where they are receiving the necessary psychological and medical assistance,' the ministry said.
Vladimir Medinsky, the head of Russia's delegation for peace talks with Ukraine, said last week that the exchange would be the largest since the start of the three-year war. He said Russia would transfer the bodies of more than 6,000 killed Ukrainian troops, plus an unspecified number of wounded servicemen.
Monday's news comes after a weekend of accusations being hurled between both Moscow and Kyiv in relation to the exchange.
Russia accused Ukraine of unexpectedly postponing the transfer of dead Ukrainian soldiers' bodies, leaving hundreds of body bags inside refrigerated trucks waiting at an exchange point it said Kyiv had agreed to.
Ukrainian officials rejected Russia's account of events, saying that the two sides had agreed to exchange seriously wounded and young troops on Saturday, but a date had not yet been set for the repatriation of soldiers' remains.
The prisoner swap was a result of a second set of direct peace negotiations that took place last Monday in Istanbul. Though the exchange was agreed upon, there were no major breakthroughs, with talks lasting a little over an hour.
As the prisoner exchange will last multiple days, and is 'quite complex,' negotiations between Russia and Ukraine will 'continue virtually every day,' Zelensky said Monday.
'We count on the full implementation of the humanitarian agreements reached during the meeting in Istanbul. We are doing everything possible to bring back every single person. We are working toward this at every level,' he added.
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