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Belgorod Region governor says ready to meet with saboteurs to save prisoners

"I am grieved to say but most probably, they have killed them (prisoners - TASS). But is they are alive, from 5:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. at the Shebekino checkpoint. I guarantee security," he said

Governor of Russia’s Belgorod Region Vyacheslav Gladkov Anton Vergun/TASS

Governor of Russia’s Belgorod Region Vyacheslav Gladkov

© Anton Vergun/TASS

MOSCOW, June 4. /TASS/. Governor of Russia’s Belgorod Region Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Sunday he is ready to meet with Ukrainian saboteurs at the Shebekino checkpoint for the sake of saving Russian prisoners of war, if they are still alive.

"I am grieved to say but most probably, they have killed them (prisoners - TASS). But is they are alive, from 5:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. at the Shebekino checkpoint. I guarantee security," he said in a video address posted on his Telegram channel.

According to Gladkov, sabotage and reconnaissance groups infiltrated the village of Novaya Tavolzhanka in the Belgorod Region; fighting is underway.

On Sunday, the Russian Volunteer Corps (listed in Russia as an organization involved in extremism and terrorism) posted an address to Gladkov on its Telegram channel inviting him to meet at a church in Novaya Tavolzhanka to discuss the situation in the region. The video demonstrated prisoners whom they promised to hand over to Gladkov at the meeting.

Located near the Russian-Ukrainian border, Novaya Tavolzhanka is one of the biggest villages in the Belgorod Region’s Shebekino district. The governor said earlier in the day that the district was being shelled by Ukrainian troops. The shelling attacks caused fires near a marketplace, in dwelling quarters and near a granary in Shebekino.

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