Ukraine and Russia exchange prisoners of war under the 185-for-185 formula
2 October 17:02
Ukraine and Russia have exchanged prisoners of war as part of the agreements reached in Istanbul, with the parties returning 185 soldiers each.
This was reported by "Komersant Ukrainian" with reference to the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Telegram, the Coordinating Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War on Telegram , and Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets on Facebook.
“We are bringing home 185 of our defenders from Russian captivity. 183 are privates, sergeants, and 2 are officers,” the head of state wrote.
He clarified that these are soldiers of the Armed Forces, the National Guard, and the State Border Guard Service. They defended Mariupol and Azovstal, as well as the Chornobyl nuclear power plant. Most of them had been in captivity since 2022.
Also, 20 civilians were returned along with the soldiers.
The President promised that all returned Ukrainians would be provided with the necessary assistance.
“Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, we have managed to bring home more than 7 thousand of our people. We have to return all of them. We are working on this every day,” Zelenskyy emphasized.
The Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War clarified that the liberated soldiers defended Ukraine in the Luhansk, Donetsk, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, Kyiv, Sumy and Chernihiv sectors.
In particular, the National Guard, who defended the Chornobyl nuclear power plant at the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion, are returning home.
The youngest released defender was 26 years old, and the oldest was 59 years old.
Ukrainian Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said that the peculiarity of today’s exchange is that almost all of the released soldiers had been in captivity since 2022.
