Azov commanders return home: A diplomatic win for Ukraine, a slap in the face for Russia

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky can be seen standing on the tarmac at Istanbul Airport as a small convoy of vehicles approaches the runway. Violin music plays in the background, and as the vehicles comes to a standstill, five passengers are filmed in slow motion as they step out of a black minivan. The Ukrainian president greets them one by one with a firm handshake and big, friendly hug. The emotion and satisfaction on Zelensky’s face is undeniable.    

“We are returning home from Türkiye and bringing our heroes home,” Zelensky said in the tweet accompanying the July 8 video that announced Turkey was letting five Ukrainian soldiers return home.

“Militarily it’s not important at all, but diplomatically and politically it’s a huge win,” said Jeff Hawn, a non-resident fellow at the Washington, DC-based think-tank New Lines Institute and an expert on the war in Ukraine.

“These guys are seen as the symbol of standing against Russia and now they are coming back home.”

Denys Prokopenko, Svyatoslav Palamar, Serhiy Volynsky, Oleh Khomenko and Denys Shleha are all former commanders of the Azov regiment, which held out at Mariupol’s Azovstal steel plant for more than two months until they were ordered to surrender to Russian forces in May 2022.

Under a prisoner exchange deal brokered by Turkey in September, the men were then banished to Turkey where they were supposed to stay until the end of the war.

In all, Ukraine secured the release of 215 Azov fighters under the deal, and Russia 55 of its own troops along with a pro-Russian Ukrainian oligarch said to have close ties with Vladimir Putin.

Upon learning the news of the five Azov commanders return to Ukraine on Saturday, Moscow reacted with fury.

“Nobody informed us about this. According to the terms of the agreement, these persons were supposed to stay on the territory of Türkiye until the end of the conflict,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

Does loyalty have a price?

Hawn said the exchange offered up a perfect PR opportunity for Zelensky while dealing a blow to Putin, whose dealings with Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan may prove more difficult from now on.

“This is a display of solidarity from Turkey. Not just words, but concrete action, which is huge because Turkey was one of the few countries that was somewhat friendly to Russia and it seems to be shifting away,” Hawn said.

Turkey seemed to pick sides even more decisively on Monday when – after more than a year of refusing to back Sweden’s NATO bid – it suddenly decided to back the tiny Nordic nation’s application on the eve of a two-day NATO summit in Lithuania.The summit also saw a private meeting take place between Erdogan and EU Council chief Charles Michel amid pledges by both Sweden and NATO to “support efforts to reinvigorate Turkey’s EU accession process”.

The following day the United States announced it would “move forward” with the long-stalled transfer of F-16 fighter jets to Turkey, although a final sale would require congressional approval.

If Turkey – which has often been NATO’s enfant terrible – has decided it is in its interest to align itself more closely with the West, this could spell further trouble for Russia. A more Western-aligned Turkey will likely make it harder for Russia to circumvent sanctions, Hawn said.

“It could become economically very painful for Russia, as Turkey is suspected of still often turning a blind eye to the techniques used by Moscow to circumvent sanctions in order to continue doing business,” he said, noting more effective sanctions controls may be put in place in the future.

Disrupting Putin’s propaganda machine

Ryhor Nizhnikau, a senior research fellow and a specialist on Ukraine at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs, said that the return to Ukraine of the Azov fighters is also throwing a spanner in the works of Putin’s propaganda machine.

“The Azov Battalion, which has had a reputation as a far-right militia since its inception, has always been presented by Russian propaganda as an illustration of Ukrainian power under Nazi influence and that must be brought down.”

Their return is especially problematic for Putin, he said, since many Russians were unhappy with the prisoner exchange deal with Ukraine in the first place.

The deal swapped “one not-so-important oligarch for several soldiers”, he explained, referring to the release of pro-Russian Ukrainian politician Viktor Medvedchuk.

“And now it has become even worse, with them (the Azovstal fighters) coming back to Ukraine,” he said.

According to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, at least one of the released Azov fighters has already hinted at wanting to return to the battlefield.

Although the return of the Azov commanders is sure to provide Ukraine with a boost in morale amid its ongoing counteroffensive, Zelensky needs to be careful in branding them “heroes” due to the regiment’s far-right tendencies.

“Before the war these fighters were much more controversial, because of Azov nationalism.  But now nationalism in Ukraine has become more radical,” Nizhnikau said.

Moreover, Nizhnikau said, “Not all Azov commanders are Zelensky supporters.”

Hawn said these differences are unlikely to pose a problem for the Ukrainian president in the short term in a time of war. “But the move could cause political problems for Zelensky in the long run.”

Until then, however, Zelensky could hardly pass up the opportunity to seal a deal with Turkey that would also embarrass Putin in the process.

This article was translated from the original in French.