The United States and Russia carried out a historic prisoner exchange Thursday when two dozen detainees, including former US Marine Paul Whelan and Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, were released as part of a sweeping deal that involved at least seven countries,
CNN reports.
Thursday’s massive swap was the result of years of complicated behind-the-scenes negotiations involving the US, Russia, Belarus and Germany, ultimately leading Berlin to agree to release Moscow’s key demand – convicted Russian assassin Vadim Krasikov.
A total of eight people including Krasikov were swapped back to Russia in exchange for the release of 16 people who were held in Russian detention, including four Americans. In addition to Whelan and Gershkovich, prominent Putin critic Vladimir Kara-Murza, who is a US permanent resident, and Russian-American journalist Alsu Kurmasheva were also freed.
“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,” National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters Thursday.
President Joe Biden gathered the families of Whelan, Gershkovich, Kurmasheva and Kara-Murza at the White House on Thursday to relay the news that their loved ones were heading home, Sullivan said.
Sullivan described the negotiations as “painstaking,” and made all the more complicated by Russia’s war in Ukraine and “the overall degradation of our relations with Russia.” The negotiations, which initially focused on securing the release of Paul Whelan, were made even more difficult when the Russians detained Gershkovich and Kurmasheva.
“It became clear that the Russians would not agree to the release of these individuals without an exchange that included Vadim Krasikov, a Russian criminal who was in German custody, not someone we could offer ourselves,” Sullivan said. “That required extensive diplomatic engagement with our German counterparts starting at the top with the President himself, who worked this issue directly with Chancellor Scholz.”
