- Category
- War in Ukraine
Ukraine Brings Home 270 People From Russian Captivity, Including 86 Convicted by Russian Courts
Prefer U24 Media on Google
- Authors
![Photo of Cyril Barabaltchouk]( "Photo of Cyril Barabaltchouk")
-72b63a4e0c8c475ad81fe3eed3f63729.jpeg "Photo of Cyril Barabaltchouk")
Ukraine has brought home 270 people from Russian captivity, including service members from multiple branches of the military and nine civilians, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced on October 23.
Those released include National Guard troops, including Azov fighters, border guards, territorial defense personnel, Navy service members, Ground Forces troops, Air Assault Forces personnel, and members of the State Special Transport Service.
We bring you stories from the ground. Your support keeps our team in the field.
Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights Dmytro Lubinets described the exchange as historic because it returned the largest number of Ukrainian service members who had been convicted by Russian courts. Among those released were 86 such prisoners, as well as one service member who had been facing criminal prosecution in Russia.
Most had been held in Russian captivity since 2022, Zelenskyy noted. The majority of those released were Ukrainian troops who defended Mariupol, while others fought on the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, Kyiv, Mykolaiv, and Chernihiv fronts.
Many of those returning had also been illegally sentenced in Russia, according to Zelenskyy.
Two of the released Ukrainian defenders had been in captivity since before Russia’s full-scale invasion, having been captured in 2018 and 2020. They spent eight and six years in captivity, respectively, Lubinets stated.
-6b8956ebc9d213fd2e7bbc6e6b43a37f.png)
The exchange also included seriously ill and severely wounded Ukrainian service members. Lubinets noted that several were in critical condition and that he had repeatedly appealed to the Russian side for their release. The youngest person released was 24, while the oldest was 63.
Lubinets stated that the exchange followed several months of negotiations by the working group of Ukraine’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, which includes the Ombudsman’s Office.
-af34b83dba0354c5d29f0143da41b854.jpg)
“We remember every single person and continue searching for everyone,” Zelenskyy wrote.
“I am grateful to our soldiers on the front lines who are replenishing the exchange fund for Ukraine so that we can bring our people home,” he continued.
The exchange comes as hundreds of Ukrainians remain in Russian captivity. In July, Dmytro Lubinets reported that 494 Ukrainian women, including civilians and service members, were still being held by Russia, while Moscow had largely stopped including women in prisoner exchanges.
Discuss this article:
-29a1a43aba23f9bb779a1ac8b98d2121.jpeg "Photo of Illia Kabachynskyi")
-37d0c4e589b794d453938c254fb3d00d.png "Comoros-flagged tanker KHORYV, Dnipro city, Ukraine, 2021.")
