What you need to know about the largest prisoner swap between Russia and the US in the post-Soviet era

The United States and Russia completed on Thursday its largest prisoner exchange of the post-Soviet era, a deal that included 24 people, many months of negotiations and concessions from other European countries that freed Russians they had in custody as part of the operation.

Here are some interesting facts:

Who was left free?

Among the 24 people — some known, some not — are a number of journalists and political dissidents, suspected spies, a hacker and a fraudster and even a convicted murderer.

Russia has released 16 people, including Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan, a corporate security executive from Michigan. Both faced lengthy prison terms after being sentenced in Russia’s politicized judicial system on espionage charges that the U.S. government has called baseless.

The Kremlin also released Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reporter Alsu Kurmasheva, who has dual US-Russian citizenship and was sentenced in July for spreading false information about the Moscow military, accusations that both his family and the media have rejected.

Gershkovich, Whelan and Kurmasheva They arrived at Joint Base Andrews on Thursday evening.in Maryland, where they were received by President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.

Russia also released Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Kremlin critic and Pulitzer Prize-winning writer who was serving a 25-year sentence for treason, a charge widely seen as politically motivated.

On the other hand, the best known of the eight people who returned to Russia is Vadim Krasikov, convicted in Germany in 2021 for the murder of a former Chechen rebel in a Berlin park two years earlier, apparently on the orders of Moscow’s security services. Two alleged “sleeper” agents imprisoned in Slovenia, three men indicted by US federal authorities and two others returned from Norway and Poland will also return.

A breakthrough in US-Russia relations?

It is unlikely.

Washington and Moscow have already closed other swaps during Russia’s war with Ukraine, including one in December 2022 in which Moscow released WNBA star Brittney Griner in exchange for the known arms dealer Viktor Bout.

But none of those exchanges resulted in a significant improvement in relations, especially at a time when Russian President Vladimir Putin has refused to stop his aggression against Ukraine and Washington continues to provide significant military support to kyiv.

The prisoner swaps have been a rare source of compromise and a meeting of mutually acceptable interests rather than a reflection of anything broader. Still, the fact that they were able to pull off the deal at a time of open hostility is remarkable.

The Americans Left Behind

While Thursday’s deal includes the most high-profile Americans held in Russia, including two formally designated as unjustly detained, there are still more.

The group includes Travis Leake, a musician sentenced to prison for drug offences; Gordon Black, a US soldier convicted of robbery and death threats; Marc Fogel, a teacher also convicted of drugs; and Ksenia Khavana, who was arrested in Yekaterinburg in February for treason, accused of raising money for the Ukrainian army.

Khavana had returned to Russia to visit family. The owner of the California resort where she had worked told The Associated Press that Khavana was raising money for humanitarian aid.

Following Thursday’s announcement of the settlement, Fogel’s family said in a statement that it was “unconscionable” that he was not included and urged Biden to prioritize his release.

A senior administration official who briefed reporters on the swap on condition of anonymity in line with White House rules said officials would redouble efforts to bring the remaining Americans home.

Imbalance among the beneficiaries

In exchanges in recent years, the U.S. government has released people convicted of major crimes, including drug and arms traffickers and a Taliban drug lord.

The latest swap is no exception: Washington and its Western allies agreed to return criminals deemed to have been duly charged and convicted.

The clearest example by far is Vadim Krasikov, convicted of killing, on August 23, 2019, Zelimkhan “Tornike” Khangoshvili, a 40-year-old Georgian citizen who had fought against Russian troops in Chechnya and later sought asylum in Germany.

In sentencing him to life imprisonment in 2021, German judges said Krasikov had acted on orders from Russian authorities, who gave him a false identity and passport and the resources to commit the murder.

Throughout the negotiations, Moscow remained steadfast in its intention to get Krasikov back and made it clear that he was first on its list. Putin hinted earlier this year that he was interested in a swap deal to free a “patriot” held in Germany.

By contrast, among the Americans and Europeans released by Russia are people Washington believed to be wrongly detained — like Gershkovich and Whelan — or detained on unfounded charges.

“Deals like this involve tough choices,” Biden said, adding, “There is nothing I care about more than protecting Americans at home and abroad.”

I could have included Navalny

At the center of the deal was a man who was never part of it: Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

When he died in February, officials were discussing a possible swap that would include him and Krasikov to satisfy Russia’s persistent request for Krasikov and facilitate the return of the Americans.

Government officials described The sudden and unexplained death of Navalny as a setback to those efforts, but they drew up a new plan to present to German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

In the end, several of Navalny’s allies were released.

The political side

Biden had previewed his commitment to a deal last week when, during his Oval Office speech announcing his withdrawal from his re-election bid, he said: “We are also working tirelessly to bring home Americans unjustly detained around the world.”

On Thursday, when he welcomed the families of the freed Americans to the White House, he congratulated himself on the success of the diplomatic feat in the last months of his administration. In an apparent allusion to the slogan “America First” of former president and Republican candidate Donald Trump, Biden said: “Today is a powerful example of why it is vital to have friends in this world.”

Trump, who also took an interest in hostages and unjustly detained Americans during his presidency, said during the June debate with Biden that he would bring Gershkovich in as soon as he won the election.

But on Thursday he lashed out at the deal, wrongly suggesting on his Truth Social platform that Washington had paid Russia for the deal.

″Are we releasing murderers or criminals? Just out of curiosity, because we never make good deals, on anything, but especially on hostage swaps,” he wrote.

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