Zelenskyy brings home Azovstal commanders from Turkey

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has returned home from Turkey with five commanders of Ukraine’s former garrison in Mariupol, a move Russia said violated the terms of a prisoner exchange deal engineered in 2022.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Saturday that Ankara had promised under the exchange agreement to keep the men in Turkey and complained that Moscow had not been informed of the move.

The five commanders, lionised as heroes in Ukraine, led last year’s defence of the southern port of Mariupol, the biggest city Russia has captured in its invasion. Thousands of civilians were killed inside Mariupol when Russian forces laid the city to waste during a three-month siege.

The Ukrainian President on Saturday posted a one-minute video showing himself and other officials shaking hands and hugging the smiling commanders before they boarded a Czech aeroplane together.

“We are returning home from Turkey and bringing our heroes home,” said Zelenskyy, who met Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for talks in Istanbul on Friday.

“Ukrainian soldiers Denys Prokopenko, Svyatoslav Palamar, Serhiy Volynsky, Oleh Khomenko, Denys Shleha. They will finally be with their relatives,” he said on the Telegram messaging app.

Kyiv had finally ordered the Ukrainian defenders, who held out for weeks in tunnels and bunkers under a steel plant, to surrender in May last year. Russia freed some of them in September last year in a prisoner swap brokered by Ankara under terms that required the commanders to remain in Turkey until the end of the war.

Zelenskyy gave no explanation for why the commanders were being allowed to return home now and there was no immediate comment from Turkey.

Many Ukrainians hailed the news on social media.

“Finally! The best news ever. Congratulations to our brothers!” Major Maksym Zhorin, who is fighting now in eastern Ukraine, said on Telegram.

‘Direct violation’
The Kremlin, however, accused Ukraine and Turkey of violating agreements by releasing the commanders.

“The return of the leaders of the Azovites from Turkey to Ukraine is nothing more than a direct violation of the terms of the existing agreements. Moreover, in this case, the terms were violated by both the Ukrainian side and the Turkish side,” said Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman.

“No one informed us about this. According to the agreements, these ringleaders were to remain on the territory of Turkey until the end of the conflict,” he said.

Peskov added that the release was a result of heavy pressure from Turkey’s NATO allies ahead of next week’s summit of the military alliance at which Ukraine hopes to receive a positive sign about its future membership.

In a ceremony alongside the men in the western city of Lviv, Zelenskyy thanked Erdogan for helping secure the soldiers’ release and pledged to bring home all remaining prisoners.

He said that before the outbreak of war, “many people in the world still did not understand what we are, what you are, what to expect from us and what our heroes are. Now everyone understands”.

Denys Prokopenko, one of the five commanders, told the gathering that his men “will have our word to say” in the counter-offensive launched by Ukrainian forces in the past month.

“The most important thing is that Ukraine has seized the strategic initiative and is advancing,” he said.

Analysts said the return of the soldiers could strain Turkey’s relations with Russia. Ankara has so far managed to maintain a delicate balancing act, even helping broker a deal with Russia last year that allowed the safe export of grain and fertiliser from Ukrainian ports.

“Turkey’s a member of NATO, which has been backing Zelenskyy and Ukraine in the war. But at the same time, Erdogan has maintained good relations personally with President [Vladimir] Putin of Russia,” Bulent Ali Riza, the founding director of the Turkey Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), told Al Jazeera.

“Erdogan has not applied sanctions, unlike the other members of the Western alliance and he’s been able to do this successfully. Until now, he’s been able to broker the grain deal because he has connections with both sides. And yet, with these most recent moves that he has made – hosting Zelenskyy and then releasing the Azov fighters – is obviously going to be interpreted by Russia as heavily tilted to the other side,” Bulent said,