President Volodymyr Zelensky has explained a controversial decision in which five former Berkut riot police officers suspected of murder were included in a Dec. 29 prisoner exchange with Russian proxies in the Donbas.
He said it was necessary in order for Ukraine to have several of its reconnaissance soldiers returned home in the swap, which saw a total of 200 captives exchanged.
“It was a hard decision, it was a political decision,” he told journalists at Kyiv Boryspil airport late on Dec. 29, where he came to meet 76 Ukrainians released from prisons controlled by Russian forces in the Donbas region.
There were 12 Ukrainian soldiers among those released. They were all captured by Russian forces during battles that have taken place throughout Moscow’s war against Ukraine, which started in 2014 and has so far claimed some 14,000 lives. Of the service personnel returned to Ukraine, four were special operations soldiers.
To bring its 76 captives home, Ukraine sent 124 prisoners to Russian proxies in the Donbas as part of the biggest prisoner swap between the two sides in two years, and the most controversial one to date.
But many in Ukraine have expressed outrage in the past few days. While all of those freed by Russian-backed militants were either soldiers or civilians linked to the war in the Donbas, Ukraine sent prisoners who had no links to that conflict and were suspected or charged with different crimes.
Five former Berkut policemen, who are Ukrainian citizens on trial for allegedly shooting and killing unarmed protesters during the EuroMaidan Revolution in February 2014, were sent for exchange even without a conviction, being freed by a court on Dec. 28.
Many observers and analysts have questioned why Russian proxies wanted the former Berkut officers sent to the Donbas as part of the swap, with some suggesting it may amount to a confession of Moscow’s involvement in the violent attempted supression of the 2014 revolution in Kyiv, which ousted the Russia-backed president Viktor Yanukovich.
Activists, lawyers and family members of about 100 of those people killed during the EuroMaidan have claimed that after the release of former Berkut officers the massacre of protesters in Kyiv would go unpunished. Investigators were also probing alleged Russian links to the Berkut killings.
Moreover, Boris Gryzlov, Russia’s representative to the Minsk peace talks, said on Dec. 29 that Ukraine had pledged to stop criminal proceedings against people it included in the exchange.
That statement contradicts what the Ukrainian president said. Zelensky assured the public that the EuroMaidan investigations would continue, even without the suspects in custody. “I respect parents and relatives of those killed at the Maidan. Unfortunately, we cannot return those who passed away… But we could return those alive,” he said.
He added that if he had a choice to return one reconnaissance soldier for 100 former Berkut policemen, he would do so.
Zelensky also said that 17 people refused to be sent for the exchange to the Russian-controlled side at the very last moment. He said some of them will go back to finish their prison terms in Ukraine. “This is their choice,” he said.
Though the current exchange was shaped by a plan to swap “all identified people” from both sides, many Ukrainian prisoners did not get onto the exchange lists.
A number of people who were freed on Dec. 29 reminded Ukrainian journalists waiting at Boryspil Airport of the names of those who remain in Russian prisons or jails in Russian-controlled Donbas. Some said that freeing those remaining captives must be a priority for Zelensky.
Valeria Lutkovska, Ukraine’s humanitarian representative to the Minsk peace talks, said in an interview to Ukrinform that she was planning to negotiate the exchange of some 300 people who may still be in Russian-controlled jails in occupied parts of the Donbas.
There are also 113 Ukrainian nationals currently kept in Russia itself, but mostly in illegally occupied Crimea, according to estimations from the office of the Ukrainian ombudsman. Those captives include 89 Crimean Tatars, the indigenous people of Crimea, which was seized by Russia in 2014.
Extended coverage of the Dec. 29 prisoner exchange from the Kyiv Post:
Photos: Russia-backed militants free 76 Ukrainians in major prisoner exchange
Read also: Ukraine, Russian-backed militants exchange 200 prisoners amid controversy
Read more: Court releases former Berkut officers charged with EuroMaidan killings
More photos: Release of former Berkut officers charged with Maidan killings sparks protests
