Thursday, 26 December 2024

DEVELOPING: Prisoner Swap Involving Russia And United States Reportedly Includes Wall Street Journal Reporter, Former Marine

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The United States and Russia have reportedly agreed to their biggest prisoner swap in post-Soviet history as part of a multinational deal.

“The swap will allow the two wrongfully detained American citizens held by Moscow, Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, to return home,” ABC News reports.

“Russia freed wrongly convicted WSJ reporter Evan Gershkovich as part of the largest and most complex East-West prisoner swap since the Cold War,” The Wall Street Journal noted.

WATCH:

ABC News reports:

Gershkovich, 32, was arrested by Russian authorities in March 2023 for espionage, a charge he and U.S. officials flatly deny, with President Joe Biden saying Gershkovich was targeted for being a journalist and an American.

After an unusually hasty trial that played out behind closed doors, Gershkovich was found guilty and sentenced to 16 years in a high-security penal colony.

Whelan, who holds U.S., British, Irish and Canadian citizenship, was arrested in December 2018 while traveling on an American passport in Russia and also accused of espionage.

Both the Biden and Trump administrations denied the allegation against Whelan. He was convicted on the charges in June 2020 and sentenced to 16 years in prison, ultimately serving five.

WATCH:

From The Times of Israel:

Russian media has also reported at least six Russian government planes flying to and from the regions where the prisoners are held, according to Reuters, adding to speculation of an impending exchange.

Among the prisoners in Russia who could be involved in the swap are Kara-Murza, a Russian-British activist and journalist sentenced on charges of treason who was recently moved from his Siberian prison; opposition politician Ilya Yashin; Lilia Chanysheva and Ksenia Fadeeva, former regional directors for the offices of the late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny; human rights activist Oleg Orlov; 19-year-old dual Russian-German citizen Kevin Lik, the youngest person ever convicted of treason in Russia; artist and activist Daniil Krinari; and artist Alexandra Skochilenko.

A lawyer for Paul Whelan, the US Marine who has been held in a Russian prison since 2018, said she was unaware of his location and unable to contact him.

“There are rumors about a possible exchange,” the lawyer, Olga Karlova said. “I sent a request to the colony administration, but they are not responding.”

Neither American nor Russian officials confirmed that the prisoner movements were connected to a prisoner exchange, the Washington Post and Reuters reported, which is not unusual ahead of prisoner swaps. The largest swap since the Cold War came in 2010 and involved 14 people across both sides.


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