White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan confirmed Friday that there have been discussions around the prospect of a prisoner swap for Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, “but those discussions have not produced a clear pathway to a resolution,”
CNN reports.
Earlier this week, the Kremlin said certain contacts between Russia and the United States on the exchange of prisoners remain, but they must be carried out “in complete silence.”
“As we’ve said before, certain contacts on this matter remain, but we do not want to make them public in any way. They must be carried out and continue in complete silence,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday.
“It is true, and we have said that we remain in contact with Russian authorities at high levels on these cases to try to figure out a way to bring unjustly detained Americans home, including Evan,” Sullivan told reporters during Friday’s White House press briefing.
“We have also made clear for months now, even before Evan was detained, as we were dealing with Paul Whelan, that we are prepared to do hard things in order to get our citizens home, including getting Evan home. I do not want to give false hope – what the Kremlin said earlier this week is correct, there have been discussions, but those discussions have not produced a clear pathway to a resolution, and so I cannot stand here today and tell you that we have a clear answer to how we are going to get Evan home,” he said.
Sullivan also told reporters he met earlier Friday with representatives for the Wall Street Journal and his family “to talk about the latest status in his case and our efforts to bring Evan home.”
