Dozens of Ukrainian citizens who are in prisons doomed for cooperation with Russia were left free Last month in an attempt to secure the liberation of dozens of Ukrainian citizens who were illegally held in Russian prisons – a move characterized by human rights activists as desperate and worrying.

According to the Ukrainian government, 70 Ukrainian citizens who were convicted of cooperation with Russia were released As part of the exchange of 1,000 prisoners between Kiev and Moscow last month, according to CNN.

According to Ukraine, all of them were voluntarily exiled, in the context of a government plan that gives anyone condemned for cooperation with Russia the choice to be sent there.

However, human rights activists and international lawyers characterize the project a problematic plan that contradicts previous Ukrainian government statements and could potentially put more people at risk of being abducted by the Russians.

“I fully understand the feeling, we all want people (held in Russia) to be released as soon as possible and Russia has no will to do so … but the solution that is certainly not the right one,” said Only Sinuk, a legal analyst.

The program, with title ‘I want to go to my own’, It was started last year by the Ukrainian Coordinating Center for the treatment of prisoners of war, the Ministry of Defense, the Security Service and the Human Rights Commissioner for Parliament.

A government website describing the program features photos and personal information of some of the 300 Ukrainians who, according to the government, have been registered with the program.

Profiles 31 of them bears a stamp with the image of a suitcase and the words “left”, with a note that he or she or she “left for Russia while at the same time real Ukrainians returned to their homeland”.

According to Kiev, at least 16,000 Ukrainian citizens are known to be held in Russia, although the actual number is likely to be much higher. About 37,000 Ukrainians, including citizens, children and army members, have been officially recognized as missing. Many have been arrested in occupied territories, have been held for months or even years without charges or trial and deported to Russia. These include activists, journalists, priests, politicians and communities leaders, as well as people who appear to have been randomly abducted by Russian troops in checkpoints and other places in occupied Ukraine.

The program “I want to go to my own” is an attempt by Kiev to take back some of the prisoners without having to recognize them as prisoners of war.

However, groups of human rights urge the Ukrainian government to continue to push for the unconditional release of civilians. “According to International Humanitarian Law, it is not possible to talk about the exchange of civilians. All civilians who are illegally held must be unconditionally released, “said Yulia Gorbunova, a senior Ukraine researcher at Human Rights Watch (HRW).

‘Political prisoners’

But it seems that the plan did not deliver the results that Kiev hoped.

THE Peter Yatsenko From the Ukrainian Coordinating Headquarters for the treatment of prisoners of war he told CNN that Ukraine did not know in advance who would return.

The headquarters said that the repatriated included a group of at least 60 Ukrainian citizens who had been convicted of war criminal offenses.

The deputy head of the Headquarters, Andriy Yusov, told CNN that many of them had been convicted by Ukrainian courts and were sentenced to Ukrainian prisons when Russia began invading the invasion in February 2022 and occupied the areas where they were held.

Upon completion of their sentence, the Russian authorities were supposed to proceed with the departure of these prisoners from the occupied territories back to Ukraine. Instead, they kept them illegally in detention centers commonly used for illegal immigrants and released them only in the context of the exchange of 1,000 prisoners for 1,000.

Russian Human Rights Commissioner Tatiana Moskalkova described the convicted Ukrainian associates sent to Russia as ‘Political prisoners’, But he didn’t give more details about who was or what would happen to them next.

The website “I want to go to my own” provides details of some of those who were sent to Russia during the exchange of prisoners, including the offenses for which they were convicted. Many prison sentences for cooperation with Moscow. Some were convicted of supporting the invasion or exchange of information with Russian troops. Most received prison sentences between five and eight years.

While the site includes what, he claims, are handwritten notes by each of the convicts, who mentions his desire to leave for Russia, human rights organizations say that the way they have renounced their country is morally doubtful.