The American journalist Evan Gershkovich has been freed from a Russian jail as part of the largest East-West prisoner exchange since the Cold War.
Sixteen American and German prisoners were handed over to US officials on Thursday in a deal struck between the White House, the Kremlin and several other European nations.
Mr Gershkovich, 32, a Wall Street Journal reporter, has been in Russian custody since March 2023, when he was arrested on a reporting assignment and accused of spying for the American government.
Paul Whelan, a British-American former US marine, Vladimir Kara-Murza, a British-Russian activist, and Alsu Kurmasheva, a Russian-American reporter, are among the other Western prisoners released.
Russia received eight of its own nationals in exchange, including Vadim Krasikov, an intelligence agent know as the “bicycle assassin”, and Artem and Anna Dultsev, who were arrested living as deep cover spies in Slovenia.
The deal involved more Western countries than any other prisoner swap in history, and saw the release of Russian prisoners in Germany, Poland, Slovenia and Norway.
The swap took place at Ankara airport in Turkey on Thursday afternoon and was “carried out” by Turkey’s MIT intelligence service, the country said.
The families of the Americans released have gathered at the White House with Joe Biden, the US president, to await their return.
US officials said Mr Biden worked personally on the agreement, and was finalising arrangements with his counterparts in Slovenia one hour before his announcement that he would step back from the presidential election last month.
He also convinced Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, to release Krasikov from prison to complete the deal after talks during Mr Scholz’s visit to the White House in February.
Jake Sullivan, the US national security adviser, said the “historic” prisoner swap had required months of negotiation with Russia and coordination between Western allies to pull off.
“Today’s exchange will be historic,” he said in advance of the Ankara airport swap.
“Not since the Cold War has there been a similar number of individuals exchanged in this way, and there has never, so far as we know, been an exchange involving so many countries ─ so many close US partners and allies – working together.
“It’s the culmination of many rounds of complex, painstaking negotiations over many, many months.”
However, Andrei Kozyrev, a former Russian foreign minister, warned that Putin’s regime “sees a pattern of doing business with the West: take people and foreign countries hostage and gain criminals… in a swap of ‘good will’”.
’No detente’ in US-Russia relations
A senior US administration official said the deal did not signal a thaw in relations between the Biden administration and Russia, and condemned Mr Putin’s war in Ukraine and partnerships with Iran and China.
“I would counsel anyone to be cautious in surmising from this that it’s some sort of breakthrough in the relationship or that it portends some detente with Russia or easing in our relationships,” the official said. “That’s not going to be the case.”
The official described Krasikov, who assassinated a Georgian national in Berlin’s Tiergarten park in 2019, as a “bad dude” but said his release was necessary to secure the freedom of Mr Gershkovich and others.
“They obviously considered [Krasikov] a key asset and wanted him back, and it was no small thing for the German government to agree to let him go,” the official added.
Describing the negotiations between Mr Biden and Mr Scholz on Krasikov’s release, they added: “It all culminated really in a call by President Biden to Chancellor Scholz, and then a follow-on visit by Chancellor Scholz in in February, where basically Chancellor Scholz responded to the president saying, ‘For you, I will do this.’
“The president then turned to Jake [Sullivan] and said, ‘Get it done.’”
Gershkovich convicted at ‘sham trial’
Mr Gershkovich’s release follows months of lobbying by the Wall Street Journal and other Western media outlets, coordinated under a “Free Evan” campaign.
He is the most politically significant of the prisoners released by Russia, having been sentenced to 16 years in prison for espionage on July 19 following what was condemned as a sham trial by Western politicians.
Russian officials had previously said they would not consider a prisoner swap until after his trial had concluded.
Mr Kara-Murza, a Russian opposition figure, activist and Pulitzer prize-winning journalist, has been in prison in Russia since April 2023, when he received a 25-year sentence for criticising Mr Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine the previous year.
MPs in the UK have been lobbying the Foreign Office to request his release as part of the prisoner deal.
Mr Whelan, a former US marine who holds British, American, Canadian and Irish citizenship, was arrested in 2018 by FSB agents and accused of spying for the West. He denied the charges.
The other Westerners released by Russia are Dieter Voronin, Kevin Lik, Rico Krieger, Patrick Schoebel, Herman Moyzhes, Ilya Yashin, Liliya Chanysheva, Kseniya Fadeyeva, Vadim Ostanin, Andrey Pivovarov, Oleg Orlov and Sasha Skochilenko.
Many are associates of Alexei Navalny, the Russian opposition leader who died in a Russian prison in the Arctic in February.
US officials said Mr Navalny’s death, which was condemned by Western leaders, had complicated the swap negotiations with the Kremlin.
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