Ukraine says another "large-scale" prisoner swap has taken place with Russia, describing it as the first all-female exchange since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Andriy Yermak, head of the Ukrainian president's office, said on Telegram that the exchange took place on October 17 and freed 108 women.
"Mothers and daughters were in captivity, and their relatives were waiting for them," Yermak said.
Among the freed prisoners were 37 who held out in the Azovstal steel works in the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol through weeks of fighting in the city until Russian forces seized it in May.
Most of the women were members of the Ukrainian armed forces. Yermak posted a photo of the women walking down a road, many of them in their uniforms and smiling.
Some of the women had been captured before Russia launched its invasion on February 24 and held for holding an "extremely pro-Ukrainian position," Yermak said.
Yermak added that the women will undergo a medical examination and then will be returned to their families to recover.
He did not provide details about the prisoners who were released by Ukraine in the exchange, which he described as tense. But the Moscow-appointed head of one of the Russian-occupied Ukrainian regions said earlier that Kyiv had freed 80 civilians and 30 military personnel.
The last prisoner exchange between Kyiv and Moscow took place on October 13. That involved 20 Ukrainian soldiers and was the second of the week after 32 soldiers were freed and the body of an Israeli who volunteered to fight for Ukraine was released two days earlier.
