161 civilians were returned from Russian captivity, - Ombudsman

161 civilians were returned from Russian captivity, - Ombudsman

There are now more than 14 thousand civilian citizens of Ukraine on Russian territory. To date, only 161 people have been returned from Russian captivity.

These are people who have become hostages of the aggressor country since 2014. This was announced by the Commissioner of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine for Human Rights Dmytro Lubinets at a briefing in Mykolaiv, media reports.

“I do not keep statistics for individual regions, because there are immediately those who begin to compare figures and say that Lubinets works more there, and less there. This is not so. According to my data, there are now more than 14 thousands of civilian hostages - citizens of Ukraine, so far we have managed to return 161 people," Lubinets said.

According to the Ombudsman, such a significant difference in the figures is explained by the fact that there is no mechanism for the exchange of civilians yet, since this issue is not regulated by international humanitarian law.

“We also do not have official intermediary countries, because for them this would mean additional obligations, although there are states that help unofficially. Among those I can name are Turkey and the Vatican, although I communicate with many countries from all continents.” ,” Lubinets noted.