Head of the Secretariat of the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, Bohdan Okhrimenko, has said that russia does not want to exchange prisoners of war from Azov and marines, but russian negotiators are interested in exchanging conscripts and Chechens.
Okhrimenko said this in an interview with Ukrinform.
"Regarding the "Azovites", as well as the marines, the situation is difficult. The Russian side does not want to return them. "Azov" was declared a terrorist organization in Russia, and when we return the "Azovites" from captivity and this becomes known to the local population, the authorities there suffer reputational losses. And the marines are perceived in Russia as motivated, trained servicemen who, upon their return, are ready to rejoin the ranks of the Armed Forces.
Therefore, if the military of other units - the Territorial Defense, the Ground Forces, the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine, whom we call the "defenders of the Mariupol garrison", are returned, then there is indeed a problem with the marines and "Azovites", Okhrimenko noted.
He also commented on the situation regarding the return of the Azov soldiers from military unit 3057 from captivity.
"There were mixed units in Azovstal, there were representatives of all types and branches of the armed forces. Prokopenko then commanded the "Azov" battalion of military unit 3057 (commander of the Azov National Guard brigade Denys Prokopenko - Ed.). And now he commands the entire unit 3057. The return of personnel from other subdivisions of this unit should also be a priority. I can say that we have returned 30% of the servicemen of military unit 3057 from captivity," Okhrimenko noted.
According to him, negotiators from the russian side express interest in the return of conscripts and Chechens from captivity, primarily.
"The work of our negotiators sometimes consists in the fact that, in addition to reaching agreements on the return of our citizens, we persuade the Russians to take their own. They have a huge number of forcibly mobilized, agitated from penal colonies. A large number of mobilized from the occupied territories, from the quasi-republics of "L/DPR", which Russia does not consider its citizens... They are not interested in people from small nations, except for the Chechens. For some reason, they spit on their own citizens, but they are ready to take the Chechens. There may be interest when a conscript is captured, since Putin told his electorate that conscripts will not take part in hostilities. And they really do, and we showed it," he said.
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