It was a burst of unity and joy on Sept. 7, when 35 Ukrainian nationals returned home after being held prisoner in Russia, while 35 people held by Ukraine were sent back to Russia.
But apart from joy, the day brought several revelations.
For one, the reaction outside Ukraine was drastically different than inside.
Some Western governments praised Russia for releasing the prisoners, even though they had largely been imprisoned on fabricated charges and shouldn’t have been serving time in the first place.
The Netherlands in particular were dissatisfied. Among the citizens that Ukraine gave up was a suspect in the downing of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine in 2014 that killed all 298 people aboard, most of whom were Dutch citizens.
Still, the exchange may have provided a political benefit to Ukraine.
By demanding the prisoner connected to the MH17 downing, Russia indirectly admitted complicity. Although investigators proved that the plane was shot down by a Russian-made missile, and other investigators have even identified the Russian military unit involved, the Kremlin has denied its involvement and blamed Ukraine.
Different demands
There was a striking difference between the two countries’ demands.
Ukraine sought to get Ukrainian citizens who were captured as prisoners of war or jailed on bogus charges. Russia, however, wanted mostly Ukrainian citizens, some of whom were Russia-backed militants, captured while fighting in eastern Ukraine. Of the 35 people Russia received, only 12 were Russian nationals.
Whom Russia got
Almost all the Russian nationals released in the exchange were soldiers and militants.
They included Russia soldiers Viktor Ageev, captured when fighting against Ukraine in Donbas. Russia has been denying it was sending its military in eastern Ukraine, despite ample evidence.
There were also two former Ukrainian soldiers who switched sides and joined the Russian army, Maksim Odintsov and Alexandr Baranov. They were captured while on vacation in Ukraine.
Another released prisoner was Ihor Kimakovsky, a Russian citizen, prosecuted in Ukraine for reporting to Russia on the deployment of Ukrainian troops. Another Russian national, Evgeny Mefyodov led the pro-Russian forces during the 2014 Odesa tragedy, a clash between pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian activists that resulted in a fire that killed 48 people.
Others released Russians were fighting against Ukraine forces on the side of Russia-backed insurgents in Donbas.
Russia also demanded a number of Ukrainian citizens who had been prosecuted for terrorism and espionage for Russia.
One was Valery Kirsanov, a resident of Mariupol. In 2015, he was tipping off Russia-backed militants where to shell the city. The shelling of Mariupol in January 2015 killed 31 civilians.
Others were no less notorious.
Yulia Prasolova planted a bomb, killing a Ukrainian Security Service officer. Stanislav Ezhov worked as a translator for Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman and leaked secret information to the Russian FSB security service.
Kirill Vyshinsky, a dual Russian-Ukrainian citizen who led Russia’s propagandistic RIA Novosti news agency in Ukraine, was tried for treason.
Although Moscow continually denies its involvement in the war against Ukraine, it keeps working to release its soldiers and those working for Russian intelligence agencies when they get caught by Ukraine.
Back in 2016, Russia demanded Aleksander Aleksandrov and Yevgeniy Yerofeev, two Russian military officers captured in eastern Ukraine. They were released in exchange for Ukrainian military pilot Nadia Savchenko, who was captured in Donbas and prosecuted in Russia.
The MH17 case
During the Sept. 7 prisoner exchange, the person of most interest to Russia was Volodymyr Tsemakh, a Ukrainian national from Snizhne, a small-town in the occupied Donbas who was captured by Ukraine’s Security Service earlier this year.
Tsemakh joined the insurgent antiaircraft division in 2014. Soon after, the MH17 flight was shot down near Snizhne.
In a 2015 video, Tsemakh appeared to brag he was helping to move the Russian missile launcher Buk back to Russia after MH17 was shot down.
A Buk launcher was used to shoot down MH17, according to the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) tasked with investigating the tragedy.
Led by Dutch Prosecutor General Fred Westerbeke, the group issued a report in May 2018 concluding that the rocket launcher came from Kursk, Russia, and was promptly transported back to Russia after shooting down the plane.
Dutch Prosecutor General Fred Westerbeke speaks at a press conference in the Netherlands on June 19, 2019. That day, Westerbeke disclosed the names of four men suspected of shooting down the MH17 flight in July 2014. (AFP)
In Ukraine, Tsemakh was tried for terrorism. But the Joint Investigation Team sees him as a suspect in the MH17 investigation.
Westerbeke and 40 European parliament members petitioned Ukraine to keep Tsemakh in Ukrainian custody in order to have him available for future questioning.
Even though Russia has denied any involvement in the incident, it demanded that Tsemakh was included in the exchange.
Russia made his release a strict condition for the exchange to take place, according to the people negotiating the swap on the Ukrainian side.
Netherlands unhappy
In an Aug. 21 comment to Bellingcat, an open-source investigation project that was the first to find evidence of Russia shooting down MH17, Westerbeke said that Russia is deliberately sabotaging the investigation.
“They have been spreading false information, alternative scenarios which didn’t take place, and created proof for that,” he said.
But the Western reaction to the exchange has been puzzling to many.
Countries directly involved in the MH17 investigation were primarily angry with Ukraine for giving up a key suspect.
In a letter to the Dutch parliament, Stef Blok, the Netherlands’ foreign minister, expressed regret that Ukraine allowed Tsemakh to be released.
Chris Van Dam, a Dutch lawmaker from the pro-government Christian Democrat Appeal party, went even further, asking if Ukraine remains a trusted partner to the Netherlands.
Many in Ukraine were also unhappy with Tsemakh’s release.
“This (MH17) case is so important because it deals with the extent of Russia’s responsibility (in the war),” says Nadia Volkova, head of the Ukrainian Legal Advisory Group.
She characterized an upcoming court case over the downing of MH17 as “a precise lawsuit in which a precise person possessed information.”
The biggest risk for Russia in this case is that it could have been legally recognized as a participant in the conflict, something it has been trying to avoid since 2014.
Now, without a suspect, Russia can present the case as one-sided and won’t need to defend itself in court.
Earlier in the year, the investigators named four suspects in the downing of MH17 — Ukrainian and Russian nationals. Two of them live in Russia, the whereabouts of others are unknown. Tsemakh wasn’t among them.
Now, the Netherlands will have to deal with Russia. The country already asked Russia for Tsemakh to be extradited.
West praises swap
In the wake of the prisoner exchange, U. S. President Donald Trump congratulating both countries on the swap. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she “saw hope” for future peace talks.
“This is a gesture that reflects the readiness of Russia and Ukraine to resume dialogue. This will help restore an atmosphere of trust,” wrote Jean-Yves Le Drian, the French foreign minister.
Now, French President Emanuel Macron is in discussions to attend the Victory Day military parade in Moscow in May — an event most foreign leaders have avoided since 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea and started the war against Ukraine.
Many foreign leaders said they were hoping the exchange was a first sign of peace.
But the exchange has proven to be an “elegant deal” for Russia, writes Andreas Umland, senior research fellow at the Institute for Euro-Atlantic Cooperation.
For example, it released 24 Ukrainian sailors that it illegally captured in the Kerch Strait near Crimea in November 2018. But it had to release them much earlier. In May, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea ruled that the Ukrainian sailors should be released unconditionally. Russia didn’t comply, rather using the sailors as a bargaining chip with Ukraine.
Umland points out that the release of Oleg Sentsov and other political prisoners who were eventually included in the exchange was unavoidable due to their high publicity.
Yet instead of an unconditional release, Russia was able to obtain a number of high-profile criminals, including a man connected to the downing of the MH17, and was applauded for that.
