Ukraine Says 108 Women Freed In First All-Female Prisoner Swap With Russia

After nearly eight months of fighting, Ukraine said on Monday that it had exchanged more than 100 captives with Russia in what it called the first all-female exchange.

According to Andriy Yermak, chief of staff for the Ukrainian presidency, a large exchange took place on Monday, and 108 women were set free.

Our people are returning home 🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/RjCbUyXBfA

— Andriy Yermak (@AndriyYermak) October 17, 2022

“Another large-scale exchange of prisoners of war was carried out today … we freed 108 women from captivity. It was the first all-female exchange,” the Ukraine presidency’s chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, said on social media.

Denis Pushilin, the leader of the separatist territory of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine, acknowledged the trade, stating that two of the 110 participants had chosen to stay in Russia.

According to the Russian Ministry of Defense, 72 crew members of civilian ships detained by Ukraine since February have returned from there.

It stated that everyone who was brought back would be transported to Moscow and given medical and psychological support.

Some of the people transferred, according to Mr. Yermak on the Ukrainian side, were mothers and daughters who had been kept together. He said that 37 people had turned themselves in at the Azovstal steel factory in Mariupol.

Yermak’s images showed hundreds of ladies getting off white buses while others were dressed in coats and military fatigues.

With resistance centered on a complex system of underground tunnels at its Azovstal steel mill, Mariupol, a port city on the Sea of Azov in southeast Ukraine, endured weeks of persistent Russian bombing.

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