Russian negotiators interested in repatriation of conscripts and Chechens – Coordination Headquarters

The head of the secretariat of the Coordination Headquarters for the treatment of prisoners of war, Bohdan Okhrimenko, reported this in an interview with Ukrinform.

“Our negotiators sometimes have the task, in addition to reaching agreements on the return of our citizens, of convincing the Russians to accept their own prisoners. They have a huge number of forcibly conscripted soldiers, some of whom were recruited from prisons. Many of these prisoners come from the occupied territories or from the so-called republics of the “L/DPR”, which Russia does not consider its citizens… They are not interested in small ethnic groups, except for the Chechens. For some reason, they ignore their own citizens, but are ready to take Chechens. There may also be interest when a conscript is captured, since Putin made it clear to his electorate that conscripts are not sent to fight, but they do participate, and we demonstrate this,” Okhrimenko said.

According to Okhrimenko, the Ukrainian side is taking advantage of Russia's interest in repatriating Chechens. “That's why sometimes we exchange 40 of our prisoners for 150 of theirs,” he added.

A representative of the Coordination Headquarters noted that the detention of Ukrainian prisoners in Chechnya is a violation of the Geneva Convention, which requires that they be kept exclusively in prisoner of war camps.

“As far as HUR (military intelligence) personnel know, these prisoners are being held in Chechnya unofficially, in private factories and converted buildings,” he explained.

Okhrimenko also confirmed reports that Ukrainian prisoners of war are being held in Chechnya at critical infrastructure sites such as oil depots to protect them from Ukrainian drone strikes.

“Imagine that there are hangars with our prisoners on the territory of an oil production or refinery. Do we have the moral right to strike knowing this? This is holding back our Defense Forces,” he said.

Read also: Meetings of negotiators on prisoner exchange are taking place in the occupied territories, in Belarus and Russia – Coordination

According to Okhrimenko, the Chechens view such methods of treating prisoners as a military ruse, although in fact they violate the Geneva Convention and international law, which prohibit the use of prisoners of war as a protective element.

As reported earlier, according to the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, more than 150 Ukrainian soldiers may be held in Chechnya, 36 of whom are listed as “missing in action,” although the likelihood of their being in Grozny is very high.

The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) noted that Chechen paramilitary groups are acquiring Ukrainian prisoners of war from Russian soldiers in order to later exchange them for Chechen soldiers captured by the Ukrainian armed forces.

In early December 2024, Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov published a video of his meeting with Ukrainian prisoners of war and threatened to use them as human shields against drones attacking the republic.