Moscow, Kyiv swap 115 prisoners each in UAE-brokered exchange

Kyiv, August 24

Russia and Ukraine exchanged over 115 prisoners of war each on Saturday as Kyiv marked its third Independence Day since Moscow’s full-scale invasion.

Ukraine said the 115 servicemen who were freed were conscripts, many of whom were taken prisoner in the first months of Russia’s invasion. Among them are nearly 50 soldiers captured by Russian forces from the Azovstal steelworks in Mariupol.

The Russian Defence Ministry said the 115 Russian soldiers had been captured in the Kursk region, where Ukrainian forces launched their surprise offensive into Russia two weeks ago. The ministry said the soldiers were currently in Belarus, but would be taken to Russia for medical treatment and rehabilitation.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on X that the United Arab Emirates had again brokered the exchange, the 55th since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of its neighbour in February 2022.

Photos attached to Zelenskyy’s post show gaunt servicemen with shaven heads and wrapped in Ukrainian flags. “We remember each and every one. We are searching and doing our best to get everyone back,” Zelenskyy wrote.

Officials from the two sides meet only when they swap their dead and POWs, after lengthy preparation and diplomacy. Neither Ukraine nor Russia discloses how many POWs there are in total.

Last January, Russia and Ukraine exchanged hundreds of prisoners of war in the biggest single release.

Meanwhile, two people were killed and four wounded, including a baby, when Russian forces shelled the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, the capital of the partially occupied Kherson region, according to local officials.

Ukraine’s air force said it had intercepted and destroyed seven drones over the country’s south. Russian long-range bombers also attacked the area of Zmiinyi (Snake) Island with four cruise missiles, while the wider Kherson region was also struck by aerial bombs.