Red Cross visits POWs ‘on both sides’ of Ukraine war
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Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs) after a swop with Russian POWs in the Donetsk region, in May 2023.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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GENEVA – The Red Cross said on Wednesday that it had visited 1,500 prisoners of war (POWs) on both sides of the conflict in Ukraine, often sharing desperately longed-for news with their families.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) stressed the importance of such access to both Russian and Ukrainian POWs.
The ICRC said such visits are vital for checking detention conditions, offering support and sometimes books, hygiene items and other personal necessities, and also to relay information between the prisoners and their loved ones.
“For the prisoners of war and their families who have been able to share news, the impact is... immeasurable,” Ms Ariane Bauer, ICRC’s regional director for Europe and central Asia, told reporters.
The ICRC and its partners have so far delivered about 2,500 personal messages between POWs and their families in the Ukraine conflict, she said.
The organisation said it had also helped provide about 5,500 families with information on the fate of their loved ones in the conflict.
Visiting POWs is core to the ICRC’s mission enshrined in the Geneva Conventions, which define the laws of war.
Criticism over visits
The organisation has faced repeated criticism by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on the ultra-sensitive subject of POW visits.
He has accused the Red Cross of not pushing hard enough to gain access to Ukrainian troops captured by Russian forces.
The organisation sees it as a vital part of its mandate to “access prisoners of war on both sides”, ICRC president Mirjana Spoljaric told reporters last week.
“We are progressing,” she added.
The ICRC says it has had access to POWs held by Russia, including in recent weeks, but does not break down how many it has visited on either side.
Ms Bauer described how colleagues, after a recent visit to see a number of Ukrainian POWs in Russia, had been able to pass on messages to their families the same evening, and gather their messages to take back to the prisoners the next day.
When the team made its last phone call on the first evening, they reached a family which was celebrating the birthday of a boy who had not had any news of his father for nine months, she said.
“His birthday wish that his father would get in touch with him (came) true,” said Ms Bauer. “So now this little boy knows that his father is alive.”
Such visits and exchanges of information and details are “how humanity can be preserved even in situations of conflict”. AFP
