Former Russian colonel criticizes the country’s invasion of Ukraine on state television

Ukraine expects to hold out an alternate of Russian prisoners of struggle for the severely injured troopers evacuated from the Azovstal metal plant in Mariupol late on Monday, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister has mentioned.

“Within the pursuits of saving lives, 52 of our severely wounded servicemen had been evacuated yesterday. After their situation stabilizes, we’ll alternate them for Russian prisoners of struggle,” Iryna Vereshchuk mentioned Tuesday.

“We’re engaged on the subsequent phases of the humanitarian operation,” Vereshchuk added.

A whole lot of individuals had been evacuated on Monday from the metal plant, the final holdout in a metropolis that had develop into an emblem of Ukrainian resistance underneath relentless Russian bombardment.

What Russia is saying: Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov mentioned on Tuesday that fighters who left the besieged Azovstal plant might be handled in accordance with worldwide legal guidelines.

“President [Vladimir Putin] … ordered Minister of Protection to chorus from storming Azovstal for humanitarian causes and introduced that each civilians and the army might depart, the army after laying down their arms,” Peskov mentioned on an everyday convention name.

Peskov added that Putin additionally “assured that they might be handled in accordance with the worldwide legal guidelines.”

In an announcement on Tuesday, the Russian Investigative Committee mentioned investigators will interrogate what they describe as “the surrendered militants” who had been evacuated from the Azovstal plant.

“Investigators of the Russian Investigative Committee, as a part of the investigation of prison instances on the crimes of the Ukrainian regime in opposition to the civilian inhabitants of Donbass, will interrogate the surrendered militants who had been hiding on the Azovstal plant in Mariupol,” the committee’s transient assertion mentioned.

Practically 600 Ukrainian troopers on the Azovstal plant laid down their weapons on Monday and Tuesday, and most have been taken on buses to the city of Orlivka within the Russian-backed Donetsk Folks’s Republic.

CNN’s Anna Chernova and Uliana Pavlova contributed reporting to this put up.