INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Kyiv on Monday accused Hungary of barring access to 11 Ukrainian prisoners of war that Russia handed over to the EU country, which has
kept in isolation," he said.They communicate with relatives in the presence of third parties and are denied contact with the Ukrainian
not been informed about negotiations between Hungary and Russia.Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's chief-of-staff Gergely Gulyas said
Monday that Budapest had informed the Ukrainian authorities about the transfer after the 11 soldiers arrived in Hungary."They are not
considered as prisoners of war in a legal sense as they had been released in Russia, after which the Orthodox Church in cooperation with the
(Hungarian) Maltese Charity Service transported them to Hungary," Gulyas told a press briefing in Budapest."This conforms to both
international law and practice," said Gulyas."Naturally it was a special situation as they arrived here of their own free will," he
Kyiv over minority rights in the Transcarpathian region, Budapest has also vowed to hold up Kyiv's efforts toward EU and NATO membership.
