.Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced Friday that 49 Ukrainian POWs had actually been actually returned coming from Russia, with AFP witnessing the group being welcomed at the perimeter with Belarus.Zelensky performed not clarify whether it was part of an exchange with Russia, as is actually usually the situation, but AFP journalists had actually previously seen Russian hostages being actually loaded onto a bus near the borderline.It will be the second exchange in between the warring nations given that Kyiv's surprise attack into Russia's Kursk area.Zelensky pointed out private citizens were actually likewise amongst the returnees, consisting of a "woman who was taken hostage when she pertained to deal with her ill daddy.".He stated the substitution likewise consisted of fighters from Mariupol's 2022 Azovstal battle, along with soldiers, boundary shields as well as polices.AFP talked to 2 women in their 20s wrapped in Ukrainian banners as well as obtaining blossoms, who said they went to the Azovstal vegetation that fell to Russia after a siege in 2022." I'm finally home, I can't feel it," said 28-year-old Tamara Miroshnikova, commander of an equipped lorry of Ukraine's National Protection, pointed out.Yet another girl, 29-year-old Tetiana Bugay, stated she was a paramedic at the Azov brigade that fought for Azovstal.Previously, AFP saw the Ukrainian armed forces driving Russian POWs in a bus, some were using bonnets concealing their faces, which were actually gotten rid of as they were actually packed in to a minivan.AFP contacted a few of all of them for a while, plus all those who talked stated they were actually captured during Ukraine's surprise Kursk offensive last month.