Ukrainians held prisoner for years in Russia return to Kyiv

Ten Ukrainian civilians held prisoner for years by Russia have arrived in Kyiv after the mediation of the Vatican, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky said.

Some had been captured years before Russia’s full-scale invasion. Pope Francis has said the Holy See has been involved in past prisoner swaps during the Ukraine war.

Part of the group arrived overnight by helicopter at Kyiv International Airport, which has been closed since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine.

It was the first time in more than two years the airport had received passengers. The rest of the group arrived by bus.

It is a rare occasion when people detained after 2014, when Russia illegally annexed the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea, are released.

Among the freed was Nariman Dzhelyal, deputy head of the Mejlis, a representative body of Crimean Tatars that was relocated to Kyiv after Russia seized the peninsula. He was taken from Crimea, where he lived despite the annexation, one year before the war.

“I was in captivity, where many Ukrainians remain,” he said. “We cannot leave them there, because the conditions, both psychological and physical, are very frightening there.”

In the main hall of the airport, where pre-war advertisements still hang, former prisoners wrapped in blue and yellow flags reunited with their families and called those who could not be there. For some, the separation had lasted many years.

“I really want to hug you. I’ll be with you soon, mummy,” said Isabella Pekh, the daughter of freed art historian Olena Pekh, through a video call. “I’m so sorry I couldn’t meet you.”

For almost six years, Isabella Pekh spoke at international conferences and appealed to foreign ambassadors for help in freeing her mother, who was detained in the occupied part of the Donetsk region. Eventually, her efforts succeeded.

“It was six years of hell that words cannot describe. But I knew I had my homeland, I had people who loved me, I had my daughter,” said Olena Pekh.

Two Ukrainian Greek Catholic priests were among those freed. One, Bohdan Heleta, was detained in 2022 in his church in the occupied city of Berdiansk in the south-eastern region of Zaporizhzhia.

“There are a lot of our men and women there,” Mr Heleta said of those who remain imprisoned. “They need help, concrete help. They are waiting for it.”

Francis, in an address on Saturday, called for the release of all prisoners in the war, and thanked God for the liberation of the two priests.

Mr Zelensky, in a post on X, wrote: “I am grateful to everyone who helped. I thank our team working to free the prisoners. I also want to acknowledge the efforts of the Holy See in bringing these people home.”

According to Ukraine’s Co-ordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, 3,310 Ukrainians have already been released from Russian captivity. But many thousands, both civilians and military personnel, remain imprisoned.