Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on August 14, 2025
1 min readLast updated: January 22, 2026
Add as preferred source on GoogleUkraine repatriates 84 POWs, including civilians, in an exchange with Russia, continuing regular swaps despite ongoing conflict.
KYIV (Reuters) -Ukraine brought home 84 prisoners of war in its latest exchange with Russia that included dozens of civilians, Ukrainian officials said on Thursday, at least one of whom had been held for more than a decade.
Thursday's swap included 33 soldiers and 51 civilians, according to the Ukrainian state committee in charge of POWs, which added that one of the prisoners had spent more than 4,000 days in captivity.
Another was a primary school teacher captured by Russian-backed separatists in 2019.
"Among the civilians released today are those who had been held by the Russians since 2014, 2016, and 2017," President Volodymyr Zelenskiy wrote on X. "Among the military released today are the defenders of Mariupol."
Kyiv and Moscow have carried out regular swaps during the 3-1/2-year-old war despite no lulls in fighting, with Ukraine returning more than 5,000 POWs since the Kremlin's February 2022 invasion.
(Reporting by Yuliia Dysa; Writing by Dan Peleschuk; Editing by Aidan Lewis)
A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is captured and held by an enemy during an armed conflict. POWs are entitled to certain protections under international law.
Humanitarian aid refers to assistance provided to people in need, particularly during crises such as conflicts or natural disasters, aimed at saving lives and alleviating suffering.
A POW exchange is a process where two opposing sides in a conflict agree to swap captured soldiers or civilians, often as part of negotiations or peace talks.
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