Russian state television broadcast this Monday a video of two prisoners, identified as British nationals Shaun Pinner and Aiden Aslincaptured in fighting in Ukraine, asking Prime Minister Boris Johnson to negotiate their release.
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The two men ask to be exchanged for Viktor Medvedchuk, a wealthy Ukrainian businessman close to Russian President Vladimir Putin. who was arrested in Ukraine.
They do not specify who is currently holding them, Russian forces or their separatist allies in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine.
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Victor Medvedchuk is known as “Putin’s compadre”.
EFE/EPA/Presidential Office telegram channel
The two recordings are presented as interviews with journalist Andrei Rudenko, from Russian public television (VGTRK). The reporter showed the two men a video released last week by Oksana Marchenko, Medvedchuk’s wife, calling for her husband to be exchanged with the two Britons.
The detainees then ask for the exchange in English. The place where they are detained is not specified.
According to Russian media, both were captured after fighting with Ukrainian forces in Mariupol. They belong to a unit that surrendered to Russian forces last week.
The state television #Russia released a video of two prisoners, identified as British nationals Shaun Pinner and Aiden Aslin, captured in fighting in #Ukraineasking Prime Minister Boris Johnson to negotiate his release. pic.twitter.com/YErsygACJX
— RRC News (@rrc_noticias) April 18, 2022
In a statement from the British Foreign Office, Shaun Pinner’s family said they were working with London, along with the relatives of Aiden Aslin, “also detained by the Russian army,” to “ensure that their rights as prisoners of war are respected in accordance with to the Geneva Convention”.
His family notes that Shaun Pinner is “neither a volunteer nor a mercenary, but that he officially serves in the Ukrainian army under Ukrainian law.”
He is part of the Navy. He settled in 2018 in Ukraine, his “adopted country” for four years, and married a Ukrainian, according to the text.
The family adds that he served in the Royal Anglian Regiment, an infantry regiment of the British Army, “for many years”, especially in Northern Ireland and Bosnia, with the United Nations.
With information from AFP
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