Historic prisoner exchange between Russia and the West

Russia and the West exchanged 26 of their nationals on Thursday with the help of Turkey, including American journalist Evan Gershkovich, is the largest prisoner exchange since the end of the Cold War, according to Washington.

In addition to the Wall Street Journal reporter detained since March 2023, there is also former Marine Paul Whelan, imprisoned for espionage in Russia since late 2018.

Turkish intelligence services have “conducted in Ankara the largest prisoner exchange operation in recent times,” the Turkish presidency said, specifying that it involved “26 people from prisons in seven different countries (the United States, Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Norway, Russia and Belarus).”

“Not since the Cold War have there been such a large number of people exchanged in this way,” said Jake Sullivan, White House National Security Advisor. “And there has never been, to our knowledge, an exchange involving so many countries.”

The White House hailed the prisoner swap as “historic” and US President Joe Biden hailed it as a “diplomatic feat”. Mr Sullivan highlighted Turkey's role in providing “critical logistical support (and) making this deal possible”.

“Ten prisoners, including two minors, were transferred to Russia, thirteen to Germany and three to the United States,” Ankara said.

– Families at the White House –

In exchange, alleged Russian agent Vadim Krassikov was handed over to Russia, according to the Turkish presidency. He was imprisoned in Germany for the assassination of a former Chechen separatist commander in Berlin.

Similarly Rico Krieger, a German convicted in Belarus for “terrorism” and “mercenarism”, and the Russian opponent Ilia Yashin, sentenced at the end of 2022 to eight and a half years in prison for having denounced crimes attributed to Russia in Ukraine.

American journalist Evan Gershkovich, accused of espionage, in the glass cage of the accused, during the announcement of the verdict at the Sverdlosvki regional court of Yekaterinburg, on July 19, 2024 in Russia © AFP – Alexander NEMENOV

The German government said Thursday that the exchange of prisoners with Moscow had “not been easy” but was necessary to help people arbitrarily imprisoned by Moscow and Minsk.

All the identities of those released have not yet been made public.

According to Mr. Sullivan, President Biden welcomed “members of the families of Gershkovich, Whelan, Kara-Mourza and Kurmasheva to the White House” on Thursday, while the exchange with Russia was in progress.

Mr. Biden wanted to “share with them the news” of their upcoming release.

Vladimir Kara-Mourza is a Russian opponent.

As for the “two minors”, they would be the children of a couple of Russian spies, Artem Viktorovich Dultsev and Anna Valerevna Dultseva, arrested at the end of 2022 in Slovenia, and who had been placed in foster care, according to Slovenian media.

All of them were flown to Türkiye by seven planes. AFP witnessed the landing of two aircraft, one in Russian colours, the other a Falcon, at Ankara's civilian airport shortly before 1:30 p.m. GMT.

This is the first exchange between Moscow and the West since the release at the end of 2022 of American basketball player Brittney Griner, detained in Russia on a drug charge, in exchange for that of the famous Russian arms trafficker Viktor Bout, imprisoned in the United States.

– Relief –

The United States has put pressure on Moscow to obtain the release of Evan Gershkovich, sentenced on July 19 in Russia to 16 years in prison following a summary trial for “espionage”, an accusation never supported.

The journalist, his family, his close friends and the White House have continued to denounce a completely fabricated affair. Mr. Gershkovich, a 32-year-old former AFP employee, was arrested while reporting from Yekaterinburg (Urals).

“We are immensely relieved to learn that Evan Gershkovich's ordeal, which lasted 16 months, should finally be over,” reacted the NGO Reporters Without Borders.

– Plane –

A plane previously used for the exchange of Brittney Griner and Viktor Bout had left Moscow on Thursday morning for the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad before returning to Russia late in the morning, according to the flight tracking service Flightradar24.

Two female employees of The Kremlin's number one opponent, Alexei Navalny, who died in prison in February, Lilia Tchanycheva and Ksenia Fadeïeva, are also no longer listed in their place of detention.

Supporters of the artist Alexandra Skotchilenko, sentenced to seven years for replacing supermarket price labels with messages denouncing the offensive against Ukraine, have indicated that she had also been transferred.

The same situation applies to the young Russian-German Kevin Lik and the activist Daniil Krinari, according to NGOs and media.

Among the other Russians potentially concerned, Alexander Vinnik, a computer scientist accused of having run a cryptocurrency exchange platform accused of money laundering, as well as Vladislav Kliouchine, sentenced in the United States for fraud, or Vadim Konochtchenok.

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