Ukraine said that about 130 Ukrainian prisoners of war had been released and returned home as a result of the “big Easter exchange”, and the founder of the Wagner mercenary group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, released a video of the released soldiers, writes Reuters.

• “We are returning 130 of our people. This (exchange) took place in several stages over the past few days,” Andriy Yermak, the head of President Volodymyr Zelenskyi’s office, wrote in Telegram, without specifying how many Russian soldiers were released as part of this exchange of prisoners.

Yermak said that among those who returned home are soldiers, border guards, national guardsmen, and sailors.

“I hope you don’t fall into our hands again”

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of Wagner’s mercenary group, published a video with the released Ukrainian military “before the Orthodox Easter”, writes Reuters.

• “Prepare everyone, feed and water them, check the wounded,” Prigozhin said in a video posted on Telegram by his press service.
• “I hope you don’t fall into our hands again,” Wagner’s gunman can be heard telling the soldiers before they were ordered into a truck, loading several packs of water bottles.

Footage shows more than 100 men, some limping and others being carried by their colleagues, walking down a dirt road, with a man sitting on a tank holding a white flag.

Ukrainian and Russian forces conducted regular prisoner exchanges during the invasion of Moscow, which is now in its 14th month, according to Reuters.

Despite the Orthodox Easter, fighting continued in Ukraine on Sunday, and in the south of the Mykolaiv region overnight, the Russian military killed two teenagers, regional governor Vitaly Kim reported. In the Zaporizhzhia region, the head of the military administration, Yury Malashenko, announced a “massive offensive” by Russian troops. The church was damaged, so the Resurrection service had to be canceled. “There is nothing holy, even on the night of the Resurrection of Christ!” – wrote Malashenko.