Moscow and Kyiv swap prisoners of war as Ukraine marks independence anniversary

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia and Ukraine exchanged over 100 prisoners of war each on Saturday as Kyiv marked its third Independence Day since Moscow’s full-scale invasion.

Ukraine said the 115 Ukrainian 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 Defense 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 said in a post on X that the United Arab Emirates had again brokered the exchange, the 55th since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of its neighbor 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 said in the post.

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.

According to the U.N., most Ukrainian POWs suffer routine medical neglect, severe and systematic mistreatment and even torture while in detention. There have also been isolated reports of abuse of Russian soldiers, mostly during capture or transit to internment sites.

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

Drone and artillery attacks continue

Five people were killed and five others wounded on Saturday in Russian shelling of the center of the city of Kostiantynivka in Ukraine’s partially occupied eastern Donetsk region, local officials said.

In the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, Russian shelling killed two people and wounded four on Saturday, including a baby, officials said.

Two people were killed in a Russian drone attack, and one further person in shelling, in the northeastern Sumy region.

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 overnight with four cruise missiles, while the wider Kherson region was also struck by aerial bombs.

In Russia, the Defense Ministry said Saturday that air defenses had shot down seven drones overnight.

Five drones were downed over the southwestern Voronezh region bordering Ukraine, wounding two people, regional Gov. Aleksandr Gusev said. Ukraine’s Military Intelligence Directorate claimed to have blown up a warehouse storing 5,000 tonnes of ammunition in the region’s Ostrogozhsky district. News outlet Astra published videos appearing to show explosions at the ammunition depot after being hit by a drone. The videos could not be independently verified.

Two people were wounded in a drone attack in the Belgorod region, also bordering Ukraine, regional Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov said. Local authorities did not report any casualties in the Bryansk region, where the fifth drone was intercepted.

In the Kursk region, regional Gov. Alexei Smirnov said Saturday that three missiles were shot down overnight and another four on Saturday morning.

Russian air defenses shot down two more drones on Saturday morning, Russia’s Defense Ministry said — one over the Kursk region and one over the Bryansk region.

Independence Day commemorations

Ukraine marked its 33rd Independence Day Saturday as its war against Russia’s aggression reaches a 30-month milestone. No festivities are planned and instead Ukrainians will mark the day with commemorations for civilians and soldiers killed in the war.

Speaking at a ceremony marking the anniversary, Zelenskyy announced on Saturday that Ukraine has successfully used a new domestically produced drone for the first time against Russian forces.

“Today, we had the first and successful combat use of our new weapon — a completely new class of weapon, the Ukrainian missile drone ‘Palyanitsa,’” Zelenskyy said.

He did not give further details, but added that “the enemy was struck,” and thanked the developers and manufacturers.

Zelenskyy also said that Ukraine’s offensive in the Kursk region was a “preventive strike” that made it possible to avoid encirclement of part of Ukraine’s Sumy region.

Poland’s president joins the commemorations in Kyiv

Polish President Andrzej Duda arrived in Kyiv by train early Saturday in a symbolic show of support from one of Ukraine’s key allies.

Videos posted by his office showed him being greeted by Ukrainian officials and later paying his respects in a ceremony at the Wall of Remembrance of the Fallen for Ukraine.

Duda’s visit to Kyiv, his fifth since February 2022, sends a message that Warsaw’s support for Ukraine remains strong as the war drags on for the third year.

Poland, located to Ukraine’s west, has donated arms and become a hub for Western weapons destined for Ukraine. It has also welcomed tens of thousands of Ukrainians who fled the war. It hosts the most Ukrainian refugees outside of the country after Germany.

A trade dispute over Ukrainian grain that dragged down ties last year, and historical grievances between the two countries, sometime provoke bad feelings, particularly among Poles who remember a World War II-era massacre by Ukrainian nationalists.

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Morton reported from London. Associated Press writer Ahmad El-Katib in Beirut contributed to this report.

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