Kyiv sends Moscow letter requesting response on possible swap of 23 Russians for Ukrainians in custody

18:08, 06.06.2018 1 min read

Iryna Gerashchenko, the first deputy speaker of the Verkhovna Rada and Ukraine's envoy to the humanitarian subgroup of the Trilateral Contact Group, said she has sent Russian representatives to the subgroups a letter with a list of 23 Russian citizens' surnames and the request to give Kyiv a response regarding the possibility of swapping them for Ukrainians being held in Russia.

"Today, I once again officially sent Russian representatives in the Minsk groups a letter with surnames, with a request to give Ukraine an official response on the possibility of handing over 23 Russians in exchange for the Kremlin's Ukrainian political prisoners," she wrote on Facebook on Wednesday.

She also said she requested that the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry officially send a duplicate letter to the Russian Foreign Ministry.

According to Gerashchenko, Russian representatives said at a meeting of the Trilateral Contact Group in Minsk that the fate of 23 convicted Russians is not a subject for the Minsk format.