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WASHINGTON: The United States and Russia completed their biggest prisoner swap in post-Soviet history on Thursday, with Moscow freeing journalist Evan Gershkovich and American colleague Paul Whelan, along with dissidents including Vladimir Kara-Murza, in a multinational deal that set two dozen people free. free, release

Gershkovich, Whelan and Alsu Kurmasheva, a journalist with dual American-Russian citizenship, arrived on American soil shortly before midnight to be joyfully reunited with their families. They were also welcomed by President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.

The deal unfolded despite relations between Washington and Moscow being at their lowest level since the Cold War following Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Negotiators in backchannel talks at one point explored an exchange involving Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny,​​​​ but after his death in February they eventually cobbled together a deal for 24 people that demanded significant concessions from European allies, including the release of a Russian killer, and secured their freedom. for a cluster of journalists, suspected spies, political prisoners and more.
President Joe Biden called the exchange, by far the largest in a series of swaps with Russia, a diplomatic act and welcomed the families of the returning Americans to the White House. But the deal, like others before it, reflected an inherent imbalance: The US and allies gave up Russians accused or convicted of serious crimes in exchange for Russia releasing journalists, dissidents and others jailed by the country's highly politicized legal system on charges that have seen The West as constructed.
“Deals like this come with tough challenges,” Biden said, adding, “There is nothing more important to me than protecting Americans at home and abroad.”

As part of the deal, Russia released Gershkovich, a reporter for The Wall Street Journal who was jailed in 2023 and convicted in July on espionage charges that he and the US government vehemently denied. His family said in a statement released by the newspaper that “we can't wait to hug him as much as possible and see his sweet and brave smile up close.” The paper's editor-in-chief Emma Tucker called it a “joyous day”.

“While we waited for this momentous day, we were determined to be as vocal as possible on Evan's behalf. We are so thankful for all the voices that were heard when his was silent. We can finally say in unison, 'Welcome home, Evan,'” she wrote in a letter posted online.

Also released was Whelan, Michigan's head of corporate security, imprisoned since 2018, also on espionage charges that he and Washington have denied; and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, a dual US-Russian citizen convicted in July of spreading false information about the Russian military, a charge denied by her family and employer.
Among the dissidents released was Kara-Murza, a Pulitzer Prize-winning Kremlin critic and author serving 25 years on a treason charge widely believed to be politically motivated, as well as several Navalny associates. Critics of the liberated Kremlin included Oleg Orlov, a veteran human rights activist convicted of defaming the Russian military, and Ilya Yashin, jailed for criticizing the war in Ukraine.
The Russian side got Vadim Krasikov, who was convicted in Germany in 2021 and sentenced to life in prison for killing a former Chechen rebel in a Berlin park two years ago, apparently on the orders of Moscow's security services. During the negotiations, Moscow persistently pressed for his release, with Putin himself raising the issue.

At the time of Navalny's death, officials were discussing a possible exchange involving Krasikov. But with that prospect erased, senior US officials, including national security adviser Jake Sullivan, made a new push to encourage Germany to release Krasikov. Ultimately, a handful of prisoners released from Russia were either German nationals or dual German-Russian nationals.
Russia has also received two alleged sleeper agents jailed in Slovenia, as well as three men indicted by federal authorities in the US, including Roman Seleznev, a convicted computer hacker and son of a Russian lawmaker, and Vadim Konoshchenok, a suspected indicted Russian intelligence agent. providing US-made electronics and ammunition to the Russian military. Norway returns academic arrested on suspicion of being a Russian spy; Poland has sent back a man it detained on espionage charges.
“Today is a powerful example of why it's important to have friends in this world,” Biden said.

A total of six countries released at least one prisoner, and a seventh – Turkey – participated by hosting an exchange in Ankara.
Biden made securing the release of Americans wrongfully held overseas high on his foreign policy agenda for six months before leaving office. In a speech in the Oval Office discussing his decision to abandon his bid for a second term, Biden said: “We are also working around the clock to bring home Americans wrongfully detained around the world.”
At one point Thursday, he grabbed the hand of Whelan's sister, Elizabeth, and said she practically lived in the White House as the administration sought to free Paul. Then he beckoned Kurmashev's daughter Miriam to come closer, took her hand and told the room that it was her 13th birthday. He asked everyone to sing “Happy Birthday” with him. She wiped the tears from her eyes.
The Biden administration has now brought home more than 70 Americans detained in other countries as part of deals that required the U.S. to surrender a wide range of convicted felons, including drug and gun offenders. The swaps, while celebrated with fanfare, have drawn criticism that they encourage future hostage-taking and give adversaries leverage over the US and its allies.
The US government's chief hostage negotiator, Roger Carstens, tried to defend the deals by saying that the number of Americans wrongfully detained had actually fallen even as swaps had increased.
Tucker, the Journal's editor-in-chief, confirmed the debate, writing in a letter: “We know the U.S. government is acutely aware, as are we, that the only way to prevent an accelerating cycle of arresting innocent people as pawns in a cynical geopolitical game is to remove the incentive for Russia and other nations that carry out the same abhorrent practice.”

Although she called for a change in dynamics, “for now,” she wrote, “we're celebrating the return of Evan.
Thursday's exchange of 24 prisoners surpassed a 14-person deal reached in 2010. In the swap, Washington released 10 Russians living in the US as sleepers, while Moscow deported four Russians, including Sergei Skripal, a double agent working with British intelligence. He and his daughter were nearly killed in Britain in 2018 by a nerve agent they blamed on Russian agents.
Speculation had been rife for weeks that a swap was imminent due to a confluence of unusual developments, including initially the speedy trial of Gershkovich, which Washington believed to be a fraud. He was sentenced to 16 years in a maximum security prison.
In a trial that ended in two days in secret the same week as Gershkovich, Kurmasheva was convicted on charges of spreading false information about the Russian military, which her family, employer and US officials denied. In recent days, several other figures imprisoned in Russia for speaking out against the war in Ukraine or for their work with Navalny have also been moved from prison to undisclosed locations.
Gershkovich was arrested on March 29, 2023, during a news trip to the Ural city of Yekaterinburg. The authorities claimed, without providing any evidence, that he was collecting classified information for the US. The son of Soviet émigrés who settled in New Jersey, he moved to Russia in 2017 to work for The Moscow Times before being hired by the Journal in 2022.
Gershkovich was named wrongfully detained, as was Whelan, who was detained in December 2018 after traveling to Russia for a wedding.
Whelan, who was serving a 16-year prison sentence, has been excluded from previous high-profile deals involving Russia, including Moscow's April 2022 exchange of imprisoned Marine veteran Trevor Reed for Konstantin Yaroshenko, a Russian pilot convicted of a drug-trafficking conspiracy. . That December, the US released notorious arms dealer Viktor Bout in exchange for WNBA star Brittney Griner, who had been jailed on drug charges.
“Paul Whelan is free. Our family is grateful to the United States government for making Paul's freedom a reality,” his family said in a statement.