MOSCOW, August 30. /TASS/. Viktor Medvedchuk, chairman of the Political Council of the Opposition Platform — For Life party, and Vadim Rabinovich, the party’s co-leader, who arrived in Moscow on Thursday, have met with two Ukrainian nationals serving prison terms in Russia.

"Our visit is first of all a humanitarian act. We have arrived in Russia to meet with [Stanislav] Klykh and [Nikolai] Karpyuk," Medvedchuk said in an interview with the 112 Ukraina television channel.

He reassured that "everything will be all right with the men" and they would soon be back home. "In any case, the less we speak about that the sooner the men will be home," he added.

He stressed that his party was negotiating the release of these people rather than their exchange, which was a matter of government agencies.

"Now that the government in Ukraine has changed and Vladimir Zelensky’s team has come to power, this process [prisoner exchange — TASS] has really gained momentum. It inspires optimism that this exchange will take place soon," Medvedchuk said. "This exchange will also include those people on the release of whom the Opposition Platform — For Life party has been insisting for a long time."

"When it happens everyone will learn about it. I think now we have to wait. And I think these expectations will climax happily, first of all for those who are currently kept at the Lefortovo detention center [in Moscow]," he noted.

"Many mass media outlets reported that the exchange had already taken place but so far, regrettably, there is no such readiness," Medvedchuk went on to say. "So, we are in Moscow as people’s deputies, as representatives of the Opposition Platform — For Life party, as people who had been asked by the relatives to clear the way for such an opportunity. Naturally, we are here today to facilitate such an opportunity."

Rabinovich, in turn, addressed his words to those who, as he put it, "are playing with people’s lives": "Stop indulging in politicking. Shut your mouths and let people return home." "I would put it straight that unlike the Pyotr Poroshenko regime, which was seeking to hamper all the exchanges, the situation under the current president, Vladimir Zelensky, is obviously absolutely different," he added.