In an unprecedented prisoner swap between Russia and the western nations, 24 detainees along with two kids incarcerated in Russia, Belarus, America, Germany, and Slovenia, have been repatriated. The deal, largely orchestrated by US President Joe Biden, saw three American citizens, as well as eight Russian individuals, making their way back to Moscow.
The exchange included Evan Gershkovich (32), a journalist for the Wall Street Journal, who was recently sentenced to hard labour for 16 years on disputed charges of espionage. At the other end of the arrangement was Vadim Krasikov, an officer of Russia’s FSB intelligence service. The colonel had been serving a life sentence in Germany following the assassination of Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, a notorious Georgian-born Chechen dissident, in a Berlin park in 2019.
US Marine veteran Paul Whelan and Russian-American radio journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, both imprisoned in Russia on accusations of spying or failing to fulfil duties as foreign agents, were also part of this intricate deal which occurred in Ankara. The radio station, financed by the US and known as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, stated that its three other media worker are still imprisoned in Belarus and Crimea.
Gershkovich was apprehended last year in March whilst covering a story in Yekaterinburg, a city in the Urals, under charges of espionage for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) – accusations he and the Journal fiercely dismissed. Meanwhile, Whelan, who has emphatically repudiated charges of spying, was captured in 2018 and subsequently sentenced to 16 years in prison in 2020.
The Berlin court, in 2021, dubbed Krasikov’s act as a “state-ordered murder” during his sentencing. Putin, in a recent discussion with a reporter from the west, depicted Krasikov as a “patriot” carrying out a life term in a “US-allied nation”, following his conviction for “offing a brawler”. Initially, Germany had reservations about participating in a swap deal with someone they saw as a lethal criminal, based on US recommendations.
The exchanges, however, aren’t exactly equal – Russia has always been intricately involved in what can best be described as a cynical hostage-taking game in return for its foreign captives. Even with a regime change, one could argue that Russia’s strategies are reminiscent of the Cold War era, underlining how Putin’s Russia functions.