MOSCOW, August 15. /TASS/. The Kiev regime wants to receive back only combat-ready and highly-motivated prisoners of war, with all the rest being considered as only an unnecessary expenditure item, a Russian expert told TASS.
"Kiev is interested in returning from captivity only potentially combat-ready troops who can be sent back to frontline after a short rehabilitation period. This category basically includes more motivated representatives of outlawed nationalist organizations. All others, from a financial point of view are considered as a ballast because they need to be provided with social support: privileges, allowances, awards, retirement payments," said Alexander Stepanov, military expert with the Institute of Law and National Security at the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration and senior researcher at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Latin American Studies.
According to the expert, such expenses are not envisages in the plan of spending diminishing budgetary revenues coming mainly from European sources to address absolutely different problems.
Russian presidential aide and head of the Russian delegation to talks with Ukraine Vladimir Zelensky said on August 14 that Russia and Ukraine had exchange prisoners in the 84 for 84 format. However, in his words, out of the 1,000 prisoners of war who appealed to Zelensky asking to be exchanged, the Ukrainian side accepted only two people.