.Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced Friday that 49 Ukrainian POWs had actually been actually returned coming from Russia, with AFP experiencing the team being welcomed at the border along with Belarus.Zelensky did certainly not make clear whether it was part of an exchange along with Russia, as is commonly the instance, but AFP reporters had previously viewed Russian prisoners of war being loaded onto a bus near the perimeter.It will be actually the second swap in between the warring nations given that Kyiv's surprise incursion right into Russia's Kursk region.Zelensky claimed civilians were additionally one of the returnees, consisting of a "female that was hijacked when she related to handle her ill papa.".He mentioned the swap also consisted of competitors coming from Mariupol's 2022 Azovstal battle, in addition to soldiers, boundary guards and police officers.AFP spoke to two women in their 20s wrapped in Ukrainian flags and receiving flowers, who said they went to the Azovstal plant that fell to Russia after a siege in 2022." I am actually finally home, I can't believe it," said 28-year-old Tamara Miroshnikova, leader of an armed auto of Ukraine's National Protector, stated.Yet another woman, 29-year-old Tetiana Bugay, claimed she was a medic at the Azov unit that defended Azovstal.Earlier, AFP found the Ukrainian armed forces driving Russian POWs in a bus, some were wearing hoods concealing their faces, which were actually eliminated as they were loaded right into a minivan.AFP talked with several of all of them for a while, plus all those that communicated said they were captured during Ukraine's surprise Kursk aggression last month.