The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation has stopped responding to lawyers' requests for Ukrainian prisoners of war, which complicates the process of their exchange. This is reported by the Telegram channel "Caution, News" with reference to the lawyer Leonid Solovyov. Previously, the ministry answered if a prisoner of war from Ukraine was held captive in Russia – on this basis, it was possible to start work on including the prisoner in the exchange lists. Now the military department ignores requests.
“Such actions lead to the impossibility for relatives to establish, at least on paper, whether their relative is alive,” the lawyer notes. Now inclusion in the lists is possible through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs or through ombudsmen.
At the end of December, Russia confirmed that it was holding 3,392 Ukrainian soldiers captive. This was stated by the Commissioner of the President of Ukraine to ensure the rights of defenders Alyona Verbitskaya, she is quoted by Deutsche Welle. At the same time, about 15,000 people are considered missing in Ukraine, many of them civilians.