KIEV, May 25 (Xinhua) -- The Ukrainian government stands ready to start a prisoner exchange with pro-independence insurgents in the eastern regions, Ukraine's head of the Security Service said on Thursday.
"We are ready to exchange more than 200 persons who expressed such a desire ... We are ready to do this in the shortest possible time," Vasyl Grytsak told reporters.
If the insurgent leadership agrees on the swap, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko would sign a decree to pardon the rebel supporters, Grytsak said.
Meanwhile, Daria Morozova, the self-styled ombudsman of the self-proclaimed Donetsk republic said that insurgents are seeking a prisoner exchange solely under the "all-for-all" formula.
Kiev believes that insurgents are holding at least 128 Ukrainian soldiers and civilians captured in the conflict, while insurgents said that the government took hostage 776 of their supporters.
The prisoner swap is a key part of the Minsk ceasefire agreement designed to end the conflict in eastern Ukraine that has killed some 10,000 people since April 2014.
