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Just under 50 Ukrainian soldiers were released into their nation’s custody in a prisoner swap with Russia this week.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced the latest swap on Friday, stating that 49 Ukrainians were brought home via the swap mediated by the United Arab Emirates.

“Another return of our people — something we always wait for and work tirelessly to achieve,” the Ukrainian president said.

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Zelenskyy specifically thanked the Ukrainian military units responsible for the continued capture of Russian soldiers, stating that these victories are what allowed the nation to demand swaps.

“All our warriors who capture Russian occupiers, and all our services that neutralize Russian saboteurs and collaborators, bring closer the liberation of our people,” Zelenskyy said. “We must bring home every single one of our people, both military and civilian.”

Prisoners released this week included both military personnel and civilians. It was the second swap since Ukraine began taking territory in the Kursk region of Russia, where most of their own prisoners are captured.

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Family, friends, and fellow countrymen gathered to welcome the Ukrainians taken captive by Russia that were released at an unknown location this week. (Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy Via Telegram/Handout via REUTERS)

Neither Ukraine nor Russia have acknowledged how many captured Russians were traded for the 49 Ukrainian prisoners.

The citizens’ release comes as Ukraine begs the United States for clearance to fire American missiles into Moscow.

President Biden is facing mounting pressure to lift the ban on Ukraine using U.S. weapons to strike deep inside Russia and appeared to admit on Tuesday that his administration is moving in that direction.

Ukrainian prisoners of war are seen after a swap, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, at an unknown location in Ukraine, in this handout picture. (Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy Via Telegram/Handout via REUTERS)

“We’re working that out right now,” he said when asked by reporters whether he would allow Ukraine to use the long-range Army Tactical Missile System, or ATACMS, to target sites inside Russia. Support for lifting the ban has come from all sides.

A group of high-level House Republicans wrote to the president this week arguing that such restrictions “have hampered Ukraine’s ability to defeat Russia’s war of aggression and have given the Kremlin’s forces a sanctuary from which it can attack Ukraine with impunity.”

Fox News Digital’s Morgan Phillips contributed to this report.

HONG KONG (AP) — Chinese authorities have banned the accounting firm PwC for six months and fined it over 400 million yuan ($56.4 million) over its involvement in the audit of collapsed property developer Evergrande.

The punishment is the heaviest yet for international accounting firms operating in China. PwC will be banned from signing off on any financial results in the country for six months. Already, it has been losing clients.

China’s Ministry of Finance said in a statement Friday that it was imposing 116 million yuan ($16.35 million) in fines and confiscation of illegal gains on PwC Zhong Tian, also known as PwC China, as well as a six-month business suspension, revocation of PwC’s Guangzhou branch and an administrative warning.

A separate regulator, the China Securities Regulatory Commission, also imposed fines and confiscations totaling 325 million yuan ($45.8 million) on PwC for allegedly failing to perform due diligence in the audit of Evergrande.

China’s finance ministry said PwC issued “false audit reports” of Evergrande and that the audit procedures had “serious defects” in design and implementation, leading to many false conclusions. It also accused PwC of not maintaining “professional skepticism” and failing to point out errors and a lack of information disclosure by Evergrande during the audits.

The securities regulator said 88% of the records kept by PwC regarding the real estate projects were inconsistent with the actual implementation and were “seriously unreliable.” When on-site investigations were carried out, some projects were still “a piece of vacant land” despite being considered to have met the delivery conditions, the regulator said.

“The work performed by PwC Zhong Tian’s Hengda audit team fell well below our high expectations and was completely unacceptable,” Mohamed Kande, global chair of PwC, said in a statement on its website. Hengda is the principal subsidiary of China Evergrande Group.

“It is not representative of what we stand for as a network and there is no room for this at PwC,” he said.

The statement said PwC Zhong Tian has cooperated fully with regulators, respects their decisions and will fully comply with the administrative penalties.

PwC China has fired six partners and five staff directly involved in the Hengda audit, it said. The firm is also in the process of issuing financial penalties for current and former firm leaders who were responsible for the business, the statement said.

PwC came under Beijing’s scrutiny after the January collapse of Evergrande, the world’s most indebted developer and a symbol of China’s ongoing property crisis.

China’s securities regulator said in March that Evergrande had inflated its mainland China revenues by almost $80 billion in 2019 and 2020. In May, authorities fined the company $577 million.

PwC had audited Evergrande’s accounts for 14 years until 2023 and gave it a clean bill of health.

PwC has been the largest of the “big four” accounting firms operating in China, taking in nearly 8 billion yuan ($1.1 billion) in revenues in 2022, above competitors Deloitte, KPMG and EY, according to the Chinese Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

China has been cracking down on excessive borrowing by developers during a prolonged property market slump that has hit many other parts of the economy, including construction, building materials and home appliances.

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Mistreanu reported from Taipei, Taiwan.