The Kyiv Court of Appeals has released Volodymyr Tsemakh, a fighter for the Russian proxy troops in eastern Ukraine and likely a key witness or suspect in the 2014 downing of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17.
Despite facing terrorism charges in Ukraine, Tsemakh has been released without bail or any travel restrictions. Many perceive this decision as a sign of a nearing prisoner exchange between Kyiv and Moscow.
Less than an hour after Tsemakh walked free, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Ukraine and Russia were finalizing talks on a massive prisoner swap while speaking at a forum in Vladivostok. Putin said the sides were “approaching to the final stage” of negotiations.
The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) kidnapped Tsemakh in late June in Snizhne, a city in the Russian-occupied part of Donetsk Oblast. The risky operation could have been conducted to capture him as a key witness in the downing of the Malaysian Airlines airplane over eastern Ukraine, which killed 298 people in July 2014.
According to Bellingcat, the international open-source investigative team, Tsemakh was the commander of a separatist air defense unit based in Snizhne.
The Joint Investigation Team, which includes investigators from Australia, Belgium, Malaysia, the Netherlands, and Ukraine, found that a Buk missile used to shoot down the plane came from Russia was kept near Snizhne, where Tsemakh served.
Several media and well-connected political commentators claimed Russia wanted Tsemakh to be included in the prisoner swap, which Ukraine and Russia were preparing following phone talks between President Volodymyr Zelensky and Putin.
In late August, prosecutors in the Netherlands asked the Ukrainian authorities not to give Tsemakh to Russia as he may be a witness or a suspect in the downing of MH17, Ukrainian media reported.
Zelensky announced on Aug. 23 that a prisoner exchange would occur in the coming days and he was personally working on the issue.
While there are no officially available exchange lists, human rights activists and lawyers say they will include about 30 people from each side. This would be the first major prisoner swap between Ukraine and Russia since the beginning of Russia’s war in 2014.
Through the swap, Ukraine could get 24 of its sailors who were captured by Russian forces in November in the Black Sea near Russian-annexed Crimea and also about 10 other Ukrainian political prisoners, including Crimean filmmaker Oleg Sentsov.
Russia wants to receive Kirill Vyshynsky, a Ukrainian journalist for Russian propagandist RIA-Novosti in Kyiv, and dozens of its nationals held in Ukrainian prisons on war-related changes.
On Aug. 28, a Kyiv court released Vyshynsky, who was charged with state treason, without any special conditions, much like it would later release Tsemakh.
