Ukraine has introduced house a gaggle of troopers launched from Russian captivity, President Volodymyr Zelensky mentioned on June 26, marking yet one more in a latest collection of exchanges with Moscow.
"At the moment, troopers of the Armed Forces, the Nationwide Guard, and the State Border Guard Service are returning house," Zelensky mentioned with out revealing their numbers.
The alternate follows six related swaps carried out in latest weeks in accordance with agreements reached between Kyiv and Moscow on the second spherical of peace talks in Istanbul on June 2.
As within the different latest swaps, the most recent one targeted on severely unwell and wounded POWs and in addition included a gaggle of younger troopers underneath the age of 25, the Coordination Headquarters for the Therapy of Prisoners of Struggle (POWs) mentioned.
Most of these launched had been in Russian captivity since 2022, with the youngest being a 24-year-old soldier taken prisoner in the course of the battle for Mariupol. The oldest of the freed captives was 62.
The launched troopers fought elsewhere in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, Kharkiv, Sumy, and Kyiv oblasts. Amongst these freed are a number of officers, in response to the headquarters.
"We’re doing the whole lot potential to seek out every particular person and confirm details about each identify," Zelensky mentioned. "We should deliver all our individuals house."
Russia's Protection Ministry additionally introduced a prisoner alternate with the Ukrainian facet, with out specifying the variety of troopers concerned.
Whereas no political breakthrough was achieved, each side agreed to a phased alternate ofprisoners and the repatriation of fallen troopers' our bodies. As a part of that settlement, Russia pledged to return the our bodies of as much as 6,000 Ukrainian service members and residents.
Moscow has handed over 6,057 our bodies to Ukraine in a number of phases over the previous few days. President Volodymyr Zelensky later mentioned Ukrainian authorities have confirmed that at the very least 20 of the our bodies Russia returned as Ukrainian have been truly Russian troopers.
In response to Zelensky, Moscow is utilizing this tactic as a device for manipulation to obscure the size of its navy losses from the general public.
The June 2 agreements got here after the largest-ever POW swap in late Could, when 1,000 prisoners have been exchanged on all sides.
Ukraine repeatedly referred to as for a prisoner alternate in an all-for-all format, however Russia continues to reject the supply.
The Kyiv IndependentDaria Shulzhenko