A study of the topic of foreign prisoners of war of World War II in the Middle Urals showed that in 1942-1956 there were over 250 thousand enemy troops. In percentage terms, this is just over 6% of the total number of all prisoners of the UPVI-GUPVI NKVD-MVD of the USSR. However, it was the Middle Urals that became the region where one of the first rear camps for prisoners of war on the territory of the USSR arose. At the same time, the territory of the region became the place of departure from the Soviet Union of the last echelons with repatriated prisoners of war to their homeland. On the map of the country it is difficult to find another such region or republic where enemy prisoners stayed for such a long period - from 1942 to 1956. Therefore, materials about the camps of foreign prisoners of war in the Sverdlovsk region and the fate of their prisoners with a certain degree of conventionality can be called unique. They make it possible to trace the evolution of the policy of the Soviet state in relation to the enemy servicemen who found themselves in its power and to identify the mechanisms for its implementation in a single region. The discovered data show that for the material and everyday situation and labor use of prisoners of the regional OPVI, the characteristics and forms inherent in the stay of foreign prisoners of war in the USSR as a whole were typical. Meanwhile, one cannot but highlight some fundamental features that reflect the regional specifics of the problem.