Russia and Ukraine have exchanged 103 prisoners of war from each side, both countries confirmed, with the United Arab Emirates acting as an intermediary.

The Russian Ministry of Defence said on Saturday that it swapped 103 Ukrainian soldiers held captive for an equal number of Russian POWs.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said: “Our people are home.”

The exchange of a total of 206 prisoners was facilitated in the UAE’s eighth such mediation, the Gulf nation’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement on social media platform X.

“We have successfully brought back another 103 warriors from Russian captivity to Ukraine,” Zelenskyy posted on X on Saturday.

The freed Ukrainians included 82 privates and sergeants and 21 officers from the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the National Guard of Ukraine, border guards, and police officers, he said.

The Russian Defence Ministry said “103 Russian servicemen captured in the Kursk region were returned from territory controlled by the Kyiv regime” adding that “in return, 103 Ukrainian army prisoners of war were handed over”.

Ukrainian servicemen hold the flags of their brigade and the Ukrainian national flag after being released from Russian captivity at an undisclosed location near the Ukrainian-Belarusian border [Anatolii Stepanov/AFP]

Ukrainian forces crossed the border into western Kursk last month aided with drones, heavy weaponry and artillery, catching Russia off-guard.

The Russian POWs were in Belarus “where they are being provided with the necessary psychological and medical assistance, as well as an opportunity to contact their relatives”, according to the Defence Ministry in Moscow.

In August, the two countries exchanged 115 POWs each, with the UAE acting as an intermediary.

Both sides have carried out periodic prisoner swaps via intermediaries since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, despite the absence of any peace talks between them since the early months of the conflict.

The UAE ministry said on Saturday that the total number of captives exchanged through its mediation efforts now stood at 1,994.

One of the biggest exchanges was on January 3, when the warring countries traded a total of 478 captives following mediation by the UAE.