Amid the brutal war with Moscow, Ukraine has offered to release Russian prisoners of war in exchange for the safe evacuation of the badly injured fighters trapped inside a steel mill in the ruined city of Mariupol, news agency Associated Press reported. This comes as Kyiv began preparing for its first war crimes trial of a captured Russian soldier.


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According to AP, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk on Wednesday said that negotiations were underway to release the injured fighters who are holed up in the last bastion of Ukrainian resistance in Mariupol.


In retaliation to Russian aggression on its territory, Ukraine has also shut down a pipeline that takes Moscow’s gas to Western Europe, which contributes greatly to the Russian economy.


Ukraine has also closed a Kremlin-installed politician in the southern Kherson region said officials there want Russian President Vladimir Putin to annex it.


Meanwhile, amid talks of an exchange, a former Russian fighter said that Russia’s troops were not prepared for a direct war with Ukraine


The Russian military`s failure to seize the Ukrainian capital was inevitable because in the preceding years they had never directly faced a powerful enemy, according to a former mercenary with the Kremlin-linked Wagner Group who fought alongside the Russian army, reported Reuters.


Marat Gabidullin took part in Wagner Group missions on the Kremlin`s behalf in Syria and in a previous conflict in Ukraine, before deciding to go public about his experience inside the secretive private military company.


He quit the Wagner group in 2019, but several months before Russia launched the invasion on Feb. 24 Gabidullin, 55, said he received a call from a recruiter who invited him to go back to fighting as a mercenary in Ukraine.


He rejected the offer, because, he said, he did not agree on principle with the Kremlin`s invasion of Ukraine.


(With inputs from agencies)