Kiev and Donbass Agreed on Terms of Prisoners Exchange by the End of the Year

The Trilateral Contact Group of the Conflict in Donbass Settlement agreed on the conditions for the release and exchange of prisoners according to the formula “all determined persons for all determined persons”. The Exchange may take place on December 29-30 The exchange will take place before the New Year The head of the working group on the exchange of prisoners of war from the LPR, Olga Kobtseva, told RBC about reaching an agreement on the exchange of prisoners between Kiev and the Donbass before the end of the year; This information was confirmed to the RBC by the Plenipotentiary Representative of Russia in the Tripartite Contact Group Boris Gryzlov. Subsequently, a confirmation message appeared on the OSCE website and on Twitter account of the press secretary of the President of Ukraine Yuliia Mendel. “The agreement has been reached for the fact that by the end of the year we will exchange people. All the details are not to be advertised, ”said Kobtseva RBC. “I can say one thing: there are no specific lists yet,” she added. According to the Ombudsman of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic Daria Morozova, Ukraine is still working on the preparation of a final list of persons and on the assignment exchange date. Gryzlov emphasized that Kiev had committed to complete the pardon and not to prosecute the persons being released. The decision was made at a video conference with the participation of representatives of the self-proclaimed DPR and LPR, Moscow, Kiev and the OSCE. Kiev guaranteed the procedural protection of citizens so that they would leave the territory of Ukraine and not be put on the wanted list, explained the interlocutor of RBC,  familiar with the negotiations. He said that in order to expedite the procedure, Kiev and Donbass will issue permissions to consider criminal cases against exchanged persons without their participation, and  if the guilty verdict has already been brought, they undertake to petition the President of Ukraine to pardon the convicts, that was Moscow insisted on. The exchange was agreed upon after the representative of Ukraine in the group, Leonid Kuchma, announced that he would personally engage in this process and sign the corresponding document, which would bear the signatures of other participants, including Russia and the OSCE. According to one of the negotiators, the exchange will take place in the last week of the year, from December, 25. The exchange was agreed to be held on the 29th or 30th, said the second RBC interlocutor who participated in the discussion. The videoconference fixed the failures of face-to-face negotiations A successful exchange of prisoners before the New Year means a tremendous PR effect and an increase in the rating of Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukrainian political analyst Vadim Karasev stated in an interview with RBC. This is another good news after the transit of Russian gas through the territory of Ukraine agreement signing announcement. The Kremlin, if it does not play along with the Ukrainian leader, makes certain compromises, the expert believes. The key role in the negotiations was not played by the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry led by the Minister Vadym Prystaiko, who shows diplomacy of distrust towards Russia, but by the Zelensky’s assistant, Andrei Yermak, Karasev draws attention to. The need to hold a videoconference of the Trilateral Group arose after the negotiators failed to agree on an exchange at an in-person meeting in Minsk on December 18. The self-proclaimed republics and Moscow held Kiev responsible for not agreeing on the lists a week ago. The Ukrainian side did not provide “procedural cleaning” for those who could take part in the exchange in the format “all determined persons for all determined persons”, Gryzlov said then. An agreement in principle to hold an exchange of “all determined persons for all determined persons” by the end of the year was reached at the summit in the “Norman format”, which was held on December 9 in Paris. According to the results of the summit, Zelensky announced the return of 72 people. Earlier, RBC interlocutors said that the exchange format of 250 per 100 (from Kiev and Donbass) people is being discussed. The exchange was to be worked out in the Trilateral Contact Group in Minsk. The difficulty was that for each of the participants in the exchange it was necessary to find out where and for what he was in jail; then find the grounds for dismissing the case, that is, “cleanse the people,” explained to RBC a source familiar with the course of negotiations from the Russian side. RBC