Dozens of soldiers released in Russia- Ukraine prisoner swap
KYIV, UKRAINE>> Dozens of Russian and Ukrainian prisoners of war have returned home after a prisoner swap, officials on both sides said Saturday.
Top Ukrainian presidential aide Andriy Yermak said in a Telegram post that 116 Ukrainians were freed.
He said the released POWS include troops who held out in Mariupol during Moscow’s months- long siege that reduced the southern port city to ruins, as well as guerrilla fighters from the Kherson region and snipers captured during the ongoing fierce battles for the eastern city of Bakhmut.
Russian defense officials, meanwhile, announced that 63 Russian troops had returned from Ukraine after the swap, including some “special category” prisoners whose release was secured after mediation by the United Arab Emirates.
A statement issued Saturday by the Russian Defense Ministry did not provide details about these “special category” captives.
At least three civilians have been killed in Ukraine over the past 24 hours as Russian forces struck nine regions in the country’s south, north and east, according to reports on Ukrainian TV by regional governors on Saturday.
Two people were killed and 14 wounded in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region by Russian shelling and missile strikes, local Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko said in a Telegram update Saturday.
The casualty toll included a man who was killed and seven others who were wounded Friday after Russian missiles slammed into Toretsk, a town in the Donetsk region.
Kyrylenko said 34 houses, two kindergartens, an outpatient clinic, a library, a cultural centre and other buildings were damaged in the strike.
Seven teenagers received shrapnel wounds after an antipersonnel mine exploded late Friday in the northeastern city of Izium, local Gov. Oleh Syniehubov said on Telegram. He said they were all hospitalized but their lives were not in danger.
egional Ukrainian officials reported overnight shelling by Russia of border settlements in the northern Sumy region, as well as the town of Marhanets, which neighbors the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant. Kyiv has long accused Moscow of using the plant, which Russian forces seized early in the war, as a base for launching attacks on Ukrainian- held territory across the Dnieper river.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy spoke with British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak about “further expanding the capability of the Ukrainian army” and about Kyiv’s demand for Russian athletes to be banned from the next Olympic Games, in Paris in 2024.
Sunak told Zelenksiy he’s focused on ensuring U. K. military equipment reaches the front lines as quickly as possible, a readout from his office said.
The U. K. defense ministry earlier tweeted images it said showed Ukrainian soldiers training on the Challenger 2 main battle tanks.
Elsewhere, American volunteer aid worker Pete Reed was killed in Bakhmut on Thursday according to a statement from Global Response Medicine, the humanitarian group he founded.
Reed, 33, a Marines veteran, was “killed while rendering aid” for another group, Global Outreach Doctors, GRM said.
“This is a stark reminder of the perils rescue and aid workers face in conflict zones as they serve citizens caught in the crossfire,” GRM said.