Updated 2:00 p.m. Moscow time
MOSCOW, September 9 (RIA Novosti) – Eastern Ukrainian independence supporters plan to hand over the remaining 863 prisoners to Kiev by the end of the week, according to the self-proclaimed Luhansk People’s Republic’s official website.
“During [Ukrainian President Petro] Poroshenko’s visit [to Mariupol], he announced the release of 1,200 Ukrainian prisoners who were freed by the Nororossiya army. By the end of this week another 863 Ukrainian servicemen will be handed over to Ukraine in line with the agreement on prisoner exchange. There are 311 independence forces servicemen taken prisoner by Ukraine,” the report reads.
On Monday, the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) confirmed that it had handed over 28 captured Ukrainian servicemen to Kiev.
Earlier the same day, a spokesman for the Ukrainian National Security Council, Andriy Lysenko said that approximately 20 captives had been returned to Kiev after a ceasefire was imposed in eastern Ukraine.
Kiev also expressed hopes that the prisoner exchange would be on a larger scale.
During the meeting of the Contact Group on Ukraine in Minsk on September 5, representatives from Ukraine, Russia and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) agreed to a ceasefire between Kiev and independence supporters that started at 15:00 GMT the same day. The sides also agreed to conduct an “all for all” prisoner exchange and to allow international monitoring of the truce’s implementation.
