Ukraine’s Deputy Head of the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, Andrii Yusov, reported that 1,279 Azovstal defenders have been released from Russian captivity since 2022, including 455 members of the Azov regiment.
These comments were made on air yesterday by Yusov during an appearance on Radio Liberty.
In 2022, Russia took 2,500 Ukrainian soldiers prisoner after capturing the Azovstal Iron and Steel Works in Mariupol following an 80-day siege that ended on May 16, 2022.
Azov Brigade Colonel Denys Prokopenko, himself an Azovstal defender who was freed in September 2022, was critical of the recent round of ‘1,000-for-1,000’ prisoner exchanges with Russia for not including any Azov fighters.
“Because not a single Azov resident among 1,000 exchanged people is a shame for our entire state. I do not believe that the authorities are interested in the return of Azov residents if the same people have been ineffectively engaged in the exchanges for the fourth year,” Prokopenko wrote in a post on Facebook on May 25.
Addressing criticisms that Azov fighters were not included in the prisoner exchange, Yusov said that, “This is a sensitive issue for everyone, and any public statements must be carefully considered to avoid harming the prisoners or complicating their return.”
Azovstal defenders are among the most high-profile Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs), but this has also complicated their release, as Russia has classified Azov as a terrorist organization and regularly tortures Azov POWs.
“Our prisoners are in Putin’s hands. The Russian services conducting the exchange negotiations are exploiting the media landscape to Ukraine’s detriment. The more mentions in the media about specific individuals or units, the more likely it is that this will be used against us,” said Yusov.
In March, a Russian court sentenced 23 members of the Azov Brigade to long prison terms on charges of “terrorism”.