COMMENTARY: Nine thousand five hundred freed: the last channel between Kyiv and Moscow

COMMENTARY: Nine thousand five hundred freed: the last channel between Kyiv and Moscow

Introduction: In total war, one humanitarian thread still holds

The paradox of wartime prisoner exchanges

More than 9,500 Ukrainians freed since 2022. 76 exchanges completed. The latest, on June 26, 2026, saw 160 Ukrainian soldiers and civilians return home. These figures, communicated by Zelensky and confirmed by Interfax-Ukraine and the Kyiv Independent, tell a strange, almost paradoxical story: even in a war of unprecedented brutality in Europe since the Second World War, a space for humanitarian transaction persists between the belligerents.

This thread is what I want to examine today. Not to minimize the horror of the war. Not to suggest that these exchanges signal any fundamental goodwill on the Russian side. But to analyze what the existence of this channel means — why it endures, what it truly serves, and what it tells us about the nature of this conflict more than four years into its total phase.

9,500: a number that carries weight

Nine thousand five hundred people. These are not abstract statistics. They are soldiers who had lost hope of ever seeing their families again. Civilians arbitrarily arrested in occupied territories. Young people tortured in Russian detention centers according to numerous accounts. Who one day came home — often physically broken, always psychologically marked — but alive. For their loved ones, that return is a secular miracle in the chaos of war.

Since the start of 2026, according to Zelensky as cited by Interfax-Ukraine, 1,596 Ukrainians have returned. That rate — roughly 300 per month — represents an acceleration compared to previous years. This acceleration is not chance. It reflects intense Ukrainian diplomatic investment and an Emirati mediation that is working. That deserves to be noted.

Why this channel still exists: minimal converging interests

Russian calculations behind the exchanges

Russia accepts these exchanges for its own reasons. First, it recovers its own soldiers — and in an army suffering massive losses, recovering experienced fighters has real military value. Second, the exchanges offer a facade of "humanitarian gesture" useful in its external communications — especially toward non-aligned countries it seeks to court.

Finally, the exchanges allow Russia to maintain leverage: as long as it holds Ukrainian prisoners, it keeps a diplomatic bargaining chip. Releasing them gradually, in batches of 160 instead of freeing all prisoners as international law requires, is a technique for retaining diplomatic power. Moscow knows exactly what it is doing in accepting these partial exchanges.

Ukrainian calculations: every individual counts

On the Ukrainian side, the logic is more direct and more human. Zelensky has made the return of prisoners an explicit priority of his policy. Every captured Ukrainian is a state responsibility. This commitment has domestic political value — it sustains the morale of the population and of soldiers — but it is also sincere. Ukraine treats its prisoners with an urgency that Russia has never demonstrated.

Ukraine's investment in this process is considerable. Entire teams work on the identification, location, and negotiation of each prisoner's return. Databases are maintained. Families are informed. The process has been institutionalized. It is a humanitarian bureaucracy functioning in the context of total war — and that is remarkable.

Emirati mediation: an underestimated actor

Abu Dhabi, capital of diplomatic discretion

The United Arab Emirates have become, almost without anyone noticing, one of the most important diplomatic actors in the Ukrainian conflict — not on its political stakes, but on its humanitarian dimension. Their success in facilitating prisoner exchanges rests on a combination of factors: solid economic relations with both Russia and the West, an institutional discretion that avoids media posturing, and diplomatic expertise built over years of mediation in complex conflicts.

The 76th exchange of June 26, 2026 is, according to information available via RBC-Ukraine, the result of weeks of negotiations facilitated by the UAE. This facilitation is often described as "logistical" to minimize its political importance. But coordinating the identification, transfer, and verification of 320 people between two belligerents who trust each other not at all is far more than logistics.

The limits of Emirati mediation

It would however be inaccurate to present the UAE as a neutral actor. They have maintained significant economic relations with Russia despite sanctions. Russian-Emirati commercial and financial transactions have allowed sanctioned Russian entities to circumvent certain restrictions. This reality coexists with their humanitarian role and creates an ambiguity that Western governments must manage with clear-eyed judgment.

Emirati mediation on prisoners is valuable and must be supported. But that must not lead the West to turn a blind eye to the role the UAE plays elsewhere in softening the effects of sanctions. Both dimensions coexist and deserve to be treated separately, each with the rigor it requires.

International humanitarian law put to the test

The Geneva Conventions: an ideal under assault

The Geneva Conventions establish clear rules on the treatment of prisoners of war: they must be treated humanely, have access to medical care, be able to communicate with their families, and be released promptly at the end of hostilities. Russia has systematically violated these principles, according to testimony from freed Ukrainian prisoners and reports by human rights organizations.

Documented accounts describe detention conditions amounting to inhumane treatment — food deprivation, physical violence, prolonged isolation. The International Red Cross has encountered repeated obstacles in its attempts to access prisoners held by Russia. These violations have faced no real sanction to date, which remains a major gap in the international humanitarian law framework.

Toward greater accountability: the legal challenge

The question of accountability for violations of international humanitarian law committed against Ukrainian prisoners is a complex and urgent legal matter. The International Criminal Court has already issued arrest warrants against Russian officials for other crimes. Expanding those proceedings to cover detention conditions is a priority that organizations like Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International are pressing with persistence.

This will not change the situation of prisoners still held in the short term. But documenting, prosecuting, convicting — even in the absence of the person convicted — creates a legal and political precedent that will have long-term consequences. Putin and his generals must know that their actions are on the record, that the file remains open, and that justice, however slow, can catch up with them.

The humanitarian channel and the question of peace

Can prisoner exchanges prefigure a normalization?

Some observers see in the continuity of prisoner exchanges a sign that the door is not entirely closed to broader discussions. The argument goes: if both parties can agree on 160 people, perhaps they can agree on something else. I understand that logic. I do not fully share it.

The continuity of humanitarian exchanges does not reflect a converging political will on the fundamental questions. It reflects very limited and very specific mutual interests. The same parties exchanging prisoners are simultaneously bombing each other and maintaining wholly incompatible political positions. This is not a contradiction — it is a reality of modern warfare that both dimensions coexist.

Not confusing the humanitarian channel with peace diplomacy

The risk is confusing the humanitarian channel with a peace process in gestation. These exchanges are valuable for what they are: humanitarian acts that return lives to families. They must not be instrumentalized to claim that a political negotiation is underway when it is not. That confusion would be dangerous because it risks creating false hope and weakening the necessary pressure on Russia to negotiate in earnest.

The distinction is clear: prisoner exchanges are humanitarian law. Peace is politics. Both deserve to be pursued simultaneously, but separately, without one serving as an excuse to push less hard on the other. Kyiv understands this. Brussels and Washington must internalize it as well.

What 9,500 freed Ukrainians tell us about Ukraine

A society fighting for each of its members

The fact that Ukraine has managed to organize 76 exchanges in under four years, in the context of total war, a partially destroyed infrastructure, and constant military pressure, says something important about Ukrainian society. It is a society that refuses to abandon its most vulnerable members — those held behind enemy lines.

This organizational capacity, this determination to leave no one behind, is also a form of resistance. A resistance that does not pass through weapons but through humanitarian bureaucracy, quiet diplomacy, and first-rate political will. It may be one of the least spectacular forms of resistance, but it is real and it matters.

Zelensky and his commitment to his soldiers: leadership by example

Zelensky announces each exchange personally. He cites the numbers. He thanks the mediators. He names the parties involved. This transparency about humanitarian outcomes is a leadership choice I salute. In a context where propaganda and disinformation saturate the information space, this transparency on concrete results carries particular weight.

It is also a message to his own soldiers: "I know you risk captivity. I work tirelessly so that if that happens, you can come home." This is the kind of moral contract between a military leader and his troops that, beyond equipment and tactics, can make a difference in morale and determination. Nine thousand five hundred freed. The promise is kept, for them. Not yet for all the others.

Deported children: the other dimension of captivity

Ukrainian children deported to Russia: a documented crime

Beyond adult prisoners of war, there is another category of captivity that the exchanges of June 26, 2026 do not directly address: Ukrainian children deported to Russia. The ICC issued an arrest warrant against Putin and Russian children's rights commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova precisely for these deportations. Thousands of Ukrainian children are reported to have been forcibly transferred to Russia, placed with Russian foster families or in institutions, in a deliberate attempt to erase their Ukrainian identity.

This crime, which several legal scholars classify as cultural erasure, is particularly difficult to address through conventional exchange mechanisms. Deported children are not prisoners of war — they fall into a different legal category and their return requires specific mechanisms. Ukrainian and international organizations are working on their identification and return, but progress is slow and difficult in the face of Russian obstruction.

The return of children: a distinct humanitarian priority

The return of deported children is a priority that Zelensky and the Ukrainian government have elevated to the rank of a fundamental condition for any peace discussion. This is not a negotiable position — it is a demand of international law. The forcible deportation of children constitutes a crime against humanity and an act of cultural eradication under international legal definitions — even if those specific terms are reserved for formal legal proceedings.

The Emirati mediation that facilitated the June 26 prisoner exchanges could eventually extend to this issue. But the return of deported children is even more complex than military exchanges. It requires Russian political will to acknowledge these deportations — something Moscow refuses — and verification mechanisms that Russia would systematically block. This is a long-term matter, but one that would be criminal to forget.

The memory of captivity: building the archive for the future

Documenting so that nothing is forgotten and so that justice can be done

Beyond immediate rehabilitation, the testimony of the 9,500 Ukrainian prisoners freed since 2022 constitutes a historical archive of incalculable value. These accounts document the violations of international humanitarian law committed in Russian detention centers. They name responsible parties. They describe methods. They provide evidence that neither time nor Russian propaganda will be able to erase.

Ukrainian and international institutions are working on the systematic collection of these testimonies under rigorous legal protocols — so that they are admissible before international jurisdictions. This documentation work is silent, technical, low-profile. But it is foundational for long-term justice. It is the work of historians and lawyers who will one day make it possible for the responsible parties to be named, tried, and convicted.

The memorial to captivity: honoring those who have not yet returned

For those who have not yet returned — the thousands still held in Russia or in occupied territories — the collective memory of captivity is a form of resistance. Associations of families of prisoners maintain lists of names, organize gatherings, publish photographs. They refuse to let their loved ones become anonymous numbers in a war statistic.

This resistance through memory and naming carries political and humanitarian weight. It keeps pressure on governments not to forget these men and women in negotiations. It reminds the international community that behind abstract diplomatic discussions are concrete existences — faces, names. And it says to those still detained: you are not forgotten.

Conclusion: The channel holds — and that is a fragile victory

Keeping the thread alive through the storm

The last channel between Kyiv and Moscow is humanitarian. It is a thin thread, constantly threatened by diplomatic crises and military escalations. It has held through 76 exchanges. It has made possible the return of more than 9,500 Ukrainians. Preserving it is a priority that deserves the diplomatic investment it receives. And even if this channel does not lead to peace, it leads to lives saved, families reunited, and captivity testimonies that will fuel future legal proceedings.

The war continues. The front lines shift. Bombs fall. But in the midst of that chaos, one hundred and sixty people came home on June 26, 2026. For them, for their families, that is everything. And for us, it is a reminder that even in the most brutal war, human acts matter — one by one, one hundred and sixty at a time, all the way to nine thousand five hundred and beyond.

What we must do with this

We must support exchange mechanisms, fund the humanitarian organizations that document captivity conditions, press for full access by the Red Cross to prisoners held in Russia, and build the legal cases for crimes committed against those prisoners. We must also refuse to allow these exchanges to be used as a pretext to soften the political and economic pressure on Russia.

The humanitarian channel must remain what it is: a modest but real human victory, in a war that still must be won.

By Maxime Marquette, columnist

Columnist's transparency note

My commitment on this issue

The question of prisoners of war is for me one of the most emotionally charged in this conflict. I am pro-Ukrainian and I salute the work of Zelensky and his team in bringing these prisoners home. This positioning shapes the tone of this commentary. The facts I cite come from sources dated June 26, 2026: the Kyiv Independent, Interfax-Ukraine, RBC-Ukraine, and 1lurer.

I have made every effort to ground the factual elements of this commentary in sources that are publicly verifiable and dated to the events described.

What I do not know

I did not have access to the precise details of the negotiations preceding the exchange, nor to the identities of the individuals transferred. I cannot directly document the detention conditions described — I rely on testimonies and reports from organizations whose good faith I accept but cannot personally verify. On these specific points, I acknowledge uncertainty.

On the question of deported children, I rely on reports from organizations working in this area whose findings I consider credible but which I cannot independently verify in every detail.

Sources

Primary sources

Kyiv Independent — 160 Ukrainian POWs released from Russian captivity in latest exchange, Zelensky says — June 26, 2026

Interfax-Ukraine — Zelensky: 1,596 Ukrainians have returned since the start of 2026 — June 26, 2026

RBC-Ukraine — Ukraine and Russia complete the third phase of the 160-for-160 exchange — June 26, 2026

Secondary sources

1lurer — Russia and Ukraine carried out prisoner exchange on the principle of 160 for 160 — June 26, 2026

ISW — Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment — June 23, 2026

Caliber.az — Seoul opens the door to North Korean POWs held in Ukraine — June 23, 2026