Ukraine establishes whereabouts of 11 POWs in Hungary

Oleh Kotenko, the Commissioner for Missing Persons, reported this on Telegram.

“Thanks to the coordinated work of the Commissioner's team, it was established that there are currently 11 defenders of Ukraine in Hungary who were held as prisoners of war by the aggressor country,” the statement says. 

According to Kotenko, “the names of our heroes, the route of their transfer to Hungary have been established, their relatives and the relevant law enforcement agencies have been notified.”

In addition, according to the Commissioner, “until now, there has been no information about 7 out of 11 of our citizens whose place of detention has been established.”

Russian Orthodox Church handed over Ukrainian prisoners of war to Hungary

Earlier it was reported that the Russian Orthodox Church handed over a group of Ukrainian prisoners of war to Hungary “as part of inter-church cooperation.”

The charitable organization Maltese Aid Service of the Sovereign Order of Hospitallers was supposed to be one of the intermediaries.

The purpose of this action is to try to restore the lost legitimacy of the Russian church, which is subject to extensive international sanctions.

A representative of the Main Intelligence Directorate, Andrii Yusov, said that there was no confirmation of the information about the prisoners of war.

According to him, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry contacted its Hungarian counterparts and received no confirmation from either the Hungarian Foreign Ministry, Deputy Prime Minister for Religious Affairs Zsolt Szemien, or the government.

Instead, Hungarian Vice Prime Minister Zsolt Szemien confirmed the information about the transfer of prisoners of war and noted that they were Transcarpathian Hungarians.

In its turn, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned a temporary envoy, noting that Ukraine had not been informed by the Hungarian side about the transfer of prisoners of war.

• According to the Coordination Center for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, as of the end of May, 2,430 people have been returned home from Russian captivity as a result of the exchanges. Among them are 139 civilians. As part of the last large-scale exchange, which took place on May 25, Ukraine managed to return 106 of its military - fighters from the Bakhmut direction.

• Later, on June 10, media reported that Hungary was preparing a provocative press conference with the prisoners of war handed over to it by Russia.