Ukraine and Russia have announced their first exchange of prisoners of war for nearly five months, with more than 200 freed by each side after what Russia says was a complex negotiation involving mediation by the United Arab Emirates.
Russia’s defence ministry said 248 military personnel had been handed over by Ukraine.
Ukraine said it had brought home 230 people — 224 soldiers and six civilians – in what it said had been the largest documented swap of troops so far.
Ukraine’s POW co-ordination centre also briefly acknowledged the UAE’s role in the exchange, without giving details.
“Ours are home,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on social media on Wednesday, along with a short video of some of the freed POWs.
Despite the lack of any dialogue on how to end the 22-month war, Ukraine and Russia have held many prisoner swaps since the early months of Russia’s invasion in February 2022.
But the rate of the exchanges dropped in 2023 and the last one took place in early August.
Ukraine’s Human Rights Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said it was the 49th prisoner exchange during the war.
Some of the Ukrainians had been held since 2022.
Among them were some of those who fought in milestone battles for Ukraine’s Snake Island and the Ukrainian city of Mariupol.
Meanwhile, Ukraine launched repeated missile and drone attacks on Wednesday on Russia’s southern region of Belgorod according to Russia’s defence ministry and local authorities.
Regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said the situation “continues to remain tense” in Belgorod, where Russia says 25 civilians including five children were killed in Ukrainian attacks on Saturday.
There was no word of any casualties from the latest attacks.
Later, Gladkov said authorities were relocating residents near potentially unexploded munitions, with sappers called in to evaluate the danger.
Defence ministry explosive technicians were working on disposing of an unexploded projectile and about 600 residents from 323 houses within a 500-metre radius had been relocated, Gladkov said.
Several other villages came under fire on Wednesday and a power line was knocked out, he said.
Ukraine’s escalation of attacks on Belgorod over the New Year period has come as Russia launched some of its most intense strikes on Ukraine since the war began almost two years ago.
Ukraine said on Tuesday (local time) that Russia had launched more than 300 attack drones and missiles of various kinds at cities across Ukraine since Friday.
Belgorod, like other Russian regions on the border with Ukraine, has faced frequent low-level attacks since the start of the war but Saturday’s was by far the deadliest.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said it would “not go unpunished”.
One person was killed and seven more wounded in the region on Tuesday (local time), Russian authorities said.
In Wednesday’s attacks, Russia’s defence ministry said Ukraine fired six Tochka-U ballistic missiles and six guided missiles launched from a Vilkha heavy multiple rocket launcher.
Gladkov said Ukraine also launched several drones on the region and the city of Belgorod, which is the administrative centre of the region.
Reuters could not independently verify the reports.
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