Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have met Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and two other freed American prisoners, including the Irish passport holder and former US marine Paul Whelan, just hours after Washington and Moscow completed their largest prisoner exchange since the cold war.
On a muggy evening at Andrews air force Base near Washington DC, Gershkovich, Whelan and the other freed prisoner, journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, disembarked a Bombardier Jet from Turkey and were met by their families and the US president and vice-president.
Hundreds of journalists came to the base to catch their first glimpse of the freed detainees who, combined, had spent nearly a decade in Russian captivity. They were among 16 American, Russian dissident and German prisoners freed by Russia, in exchange for eight Russians freed by the US, Germany, Norway, Slovenia and Poland. Those returning to Russia included a number of undercover spies and a convicted FSB assassin whom Vladimir Putin had obsessively sought to free from German prison for years.
Gershkovich, who was detained for just under 500 days on espionage charges in Russia, was met by his mother, Ella, father Mikhail, and his sister Danielle.
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Gershkovich’s family said earlier in a statement: “We have waited 491 days for Evan’s release, and it’s hard to describe what today feels like. We can’t wait to give him the biggest hug and see his sweet and brave smile up close. Most important now is taking care of Evan and being together again. No family should have to go through this, and so we share relief and joy today with Paul and Alsu’s families.”
Whelan, who was detained in 2018 on espionage charges and served more than five years in pretrial detention and then a labour colony, was met by his sister Ellen.
“Paul Whelan is not in a Russian labour colony any longer, but he is not home,” his family wrote in a statement. “While Paul was wrongfully imprisoned in Russia, he lost his home. He lost his job. We are unsure how someone overcomes these losses and rejoins society after being a hostage. We are grateful for everyone’s efforts to help Paul while he was away. We hope you will continue to help him by providing Paul the space and privacy he needs as he rebuilds his life. It is Paul’s story to tell and he will tell it when he is able.”
Kurmasheva, who was arrested on charges of failing to register herself as a foreign agent and then charged with spreading false information about the Russian military, had been sentenced to more than six years in prison. The Radio Free Europe journalist was met by her husband, Pavel Baturin, and her two children, Bibi and Miriam.
Among those returning to Russia was the assassin Vadim Krasikov, who has been held in a German prison since 2019 for the murder of a Chechen exile in Berlin. Additionally, several deep-cover Russian “illegal” spies arrested in Norway and Slovenia were swapped, along with Russians held on criminal charges in US jails.
Putin personally met the Russian prisoners with a red carpet reception at Moscow’s Vnukovo airport along with Kremlin guards in full dress uniform. Putin, who had lobbied personally for Krasikov to be included in the deal, hugged the assassin as he debarked from the plane. He also handed out bouquets of flowers to the family of the alleged GRU spy Pavel Rubtsov, who had posed as a journalist before his arrest in Poland in 2022.
The Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin and several other opposition figures were also freed, including the British-Russian politician Vladimir Kara-Murza and three people who had worked as regional coordinators for the opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in prison earlier this year.
Kira Yarmysh, a spokesperson for Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, said on X that Harris had called Navalnaya “to discuss the exchange and express her support”, noting her and her husband’s contributions to the fight for a democratic Russia.
Navalnaya thanked Harris for the US assistance and called on the international community to facilitate the release of other Russian political prisoners, Yarmysh said.
Early on Friday, German chancellor Olaf Scholz met some of the freed detainees, many of whom he said “feared for their health and even their lives”.
Speaking at Cologne airport, Scholz insisted the swap was “the right decision, and if you had any doubts, you will lose them after talking to those who are now free”.
The complex deal had involved months of negotiations between multiple countries and came together in extreme secrecy, with the location and exact make-up of the exchange not made public until the last moment. The US national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, told reporters that Navalny was meant to be a part of the deal before his death in February. On the day of his death, Sullivan said, he met Gershkovich’s mother and said he still saw a path forward for the deal.
The US had been working for months to try to free Gershkovich, who was arrested in March 2023 while reporting in the city of Ekaterinburg and was sentenced to 16 years in prison for espionage last month. He pleaded not guilty and the Wall Street Journal and the US government have dismissed the charges as nonsense.
Many observers linked his arrest to a Russian policy that amounts to hostage-taking, with a view to increasing pressure on western countries to release Russian spies, hackers and assassins.
Putin has long made it clear that he was open to an exchange, but insisted that Krasikov was his No 1 target. Putin became “maniacal” about getting Krasikov back, according to one source with knowledge of Kremlin discussions. “It was a symbol that we don’t abandon our people,” said the source. – The Guardian