Kyiv insists on the soonest possible release by Russia of all Ukrainian hostages held both in the temporarily occupied territory and in the Russian Federation, President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko has said.
“We declare the need for the earliest possible release of servicemen, Ukrainian activists in the occupied territory, as well as political prisoners detained in the occupied Crimea, in prisons of the Russian Federation, including Sentsov, Sushchenko, Volodymyr Balukh and many other political prisoners who for today are kept in prisons because they refused to give in the Ukrainian passport and accept Russian citizenship,” Poroshenko said during a joint press conference with German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier in Kyiv on Tuesday.
The president of Ukraine said that the issue of the release of Ukrainian hostages was raised during today’s talks with his German counterpart.A man gestures as pro-Russia rebels who were made prisoners wait in a bus during a prisoner exchange between Ukraine and pro-Russia rebels on the check-point near the city of Gorlivka on December 27, 2018.
