Russia releases US reporter in major swap for Kremlin agents

Russia freed Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich as well as jailed Kremlin critics in the largest prisoner exchange with the West in decades, in return for a prized assassin sought by President Vladimir Putin.

“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,” U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said. “It’s the culmination of many rounds of complex, painstaking negotiations.”

The swap, which took place on the airport tarmac in Ankara, Turkey, included two dozen people, 16 going to the West and eight being returned to Russia. Among them were other American citizens as well as Russians convicted of crimes and imprisoned in the U.S., Germany, Poland, Norway and Slovenia. One of those was Vadim Krasikov, who was serving a life sentence in Germany for the 2019 killing of a Chechen separatist in a Berlin park. German authorities had long resisted including him in any exchange because of the brazen nature of his crime, but Putin had made his release a top priority.

In addition to Gershkovich, who was arrested in March of last year while on a reporting assignment in Russia and later convicted of espionage – charges he and the Journal reject – Russia also let go former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, who was jailed in 2018 and later convicted on spying charges he denies. The U.S. had categorized both men as unlawfully detained and had been seeking their release.

Russia also freed Alsu Kurmasheva, a journalist with dual Russian and U.S. citizenship, who was convicted last month under the Kremlin’s strict wartime censorship laws.

Such prisoner swaps are one of the few remaining areas of diplomatic cooperation between the U.S. and Russia after Moscow’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine poisoned relations. U.S. officials accuse the Kremlin of taking Americans hostage to win the release of Russian agents and others held in U.S. prisons. Moscow denies that.

U.S. officials described the swap as a success of their long-running efforts to win the release of Americans unjustly held abroad. Moscow insisted on the release of Krasikov in exchange for Gershkovich and Kurmasheva, the U.S. said.

The exchange represents a major victory for Putin, who’d repeatedly pressed for Krasikov’s release in the face of opposition from Germany. By freeing the killer, Putin, the former KGB officer, showed his security service agents and others working for the Kremlin abroad that he won’t abandon them and will do whatever is necessary to secure their return, even amid the greatest confrontation since the Cold War between Russia and the West over his invasion of Ukraine.

Putin demonstrated that commitment with the December 2022 release of the notorious arms dealer Viktor Bout, known as the “merchant of death,” who’d been sentenced in 2012 to 25 years in U.S. prison. President Joe Biden’s administration freed him in exchange for WNBA star Brittney Griner who was given nine years by a Russian court after customs officials at a Moscow airport found vape cartridges containing cannabis oil in her luggage in February that year.

Putin said in June that Russian and U.S. intelligence services were in contact and that the Biden administration was taking energetic steps to secure Gershkovich’s release.

The latest exchange, which Turkish officials said included two minors in addition to the 24 adults, saw the release to the West of a number of Russian opposition figures, who’ve faced an intensifying Kremlin crackdown in recent years. Earlier this year, the two sides were close to an agreement that would have seen the release of Alexey Navalny, Russia’s most prominent opposition leader, but he died suddenly in prison before it could take place, according to Russian officials.

The swap included Kremlin critics Vladimir Kara-Murza and Ilya Yashin, as well as Oleg Orlov, co-chairman of the Memorial human rights group that jointly won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2022. Russian authorities also released three other jailed dissidents, pro-democracy activists Liliya Chanysheva and Ksenia Fadeyeva and artist Alexandra Skochilenko.

Russia also released Kevin Lik, a dual German and Russian national, who was serving a four-year prison sentence for treason for an act he allegedly committed when he was 16. As part of the deal, Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko, Putin’s closest ally, on Tuesday pardoned a German citizen, Rico Krieger, who’d been convicted and sentenced to death in June for “mercenary activity” on behalf of Ukraine.

The U.S. released several Russians convicted on a variety of criminal charges. Among them was Vladislav Klyushin, a Kremlin-linked technology consultant serving a 9-year sentence for insider trading, Roman Seleznev, the son of a prominent Russian politician who was serving a 27-year sentence for cybercrime and Vadim Konoshchenok, jailed on suspicion of violating U.S. sanctions against sending military technologies to Russia. The U.S. alleged Konoshchenok had ties to Russia’s Federal Security Service.

Polish authorities released Pavel Rubtsov, jailed on espionage charges, as part of the deal, while Norway let go Mikhail Mikushin, an academic who was accused of spying.

In Slovenia, meanwhile, two Russians detained as spies in 2022 pleaded guilty at a closed trial in Ljubljana and were released as part of the deal.