Griner Freed from Russian Penal Colony in Trade for Notorious Arms Dealer

WASHINGTON — Russia freed WNBA star Brittney Griner on Thursday in a dramatic high-level prisoner exchange, with America releasing notorious Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, American officials said. The swap, at a time of heightened tensions over Ukraine, achieved a top goal for President Biden, but carried a heavy price — and left behind another American jailed for nearly four years in Russia.The deal, the second such exchange in eight months with Russia, procured the release of the most prominent American detained abroad. Ms. Griner is a two-time Olympic gold medalist whose monthslong imprisonment on drug charges brought unprecedented attention to the population of wrongful detainees.Mr. Biden’s authorization to release a Russian felon once nicknamed “the Merchant of Death” underscored the escalating pressure that his administration faced to get Ms. Griner home, particularly after the recent resolution of her criminal case and her subsequent transfer to a penal colony.The swap was confirmed by U.S. officials with direct knowledge of the negotiations who were not authorized to publicly discuss the deal before a White House announcement and spoke on condition of anonymity. Mr. Biden spoke with Ms. Griner on the phone Thursday while her wife, Cherelle, was in the Oval Office. The president was to address reporters later in the morning.Russian and American officials had conveyed cautious optimism in recent weeks after months of strained negotiations, with Mr. Biden saying in November that he was hopeful that Russia would engage in a deal now that the midterm elections were completed. A top Russian official said last week that a deal was possible before year’s end.Even so, the fact that the deal was a one-for-one swap was a surprise given that American officials had for months expressed their their determination to bring home both Griner and a Michigan corporate security executive, Paul Whelan, jailed in Russia since December 2018 on espionage charges that his family and the U.S. government has said are baseless.In releasing Bout, America freed a former Soviet Army lieutenant colonel whom the Justice Department once described as one of the world’s most prolific arms dealers. Bout, whose exploits inspired a Hollywood movie, was serving a 25-year sentence on charges that he conspired to sell tens of millions of dollars in weapons that officials said were to be used against Americans.The Biden administration was ultimately willing to exchange Bout if it meant Ms. Griner’s freedom. The detention of one of the greatest players in WNBA history contributed to a swirl of unprecedented public attention for an individual detainee case — not to mention intense pressure on the White House.Ms. Griner’s arrest in February made her the most high-profile American jailed abroad. Her status as an openly gay Black woman, locked up in a country where authorities have been hostile to the gay community, infused racial, gender, and social dynamics into her legal saga and made each development a matter of international importance.Her case not only brought unprecedented publicity to the dozens of Americans wrongfully detained by foreign governments, but it also emerged as a major inflection point in American-Russia diplomacy at a time of deteriorating relations prompted by Moscow’s war against Ukraine.The exchange was carried out despite deteriorating relations between the powers. But the imprisonment of Americans produced a rare diplomatic opening, yielding the highest-level known contact between Washington and Moscow — a phone call between Secretary of State Blinken and the Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov — in more than five months.In an extraordinary move during otherwise secret negotiations, Mr. Blinken revealed publicly in July that America had made a “substantial proposal” to Russia for Ms. Griner and Mr. Whelan. Though he did not specify the terms, people familiar with it said America had offered Bout.Such a public overture drew a chiding rebuke from the Russians, who said they preferred to resolve such cases in private, and carried the risk of weakening America’s negotiating hand for this and future deals by making the administration appear too desperate. Yet the announcement was also meant to communicate to the public that Mr. Biden was doing what he could and to ensure pressure on the Russians.Besides the efforts of American officials, the release also followed months of backchannel negotiations involving the former ambassador to the United Nations, Governor Richardson, a frequent emissary in hostage talks, and his top deputy Mickey Bergman. The men had made multiple trips abroad in the last year to discuss swap scenarios with Russian contacts.Ms. Griner was arrested at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport in February when customs officials said they found vape canisters with cannabis oil in her luggage. She pleaded guilty in July, though still faced trial because admitting guilt in Russia’s judicial system does not automatically end a case.She acknowledged in court that she possessed the canisters, but said she had no criminal intent and said their presence in her luggage was due to hasty packing.Before being sentenced on August 4 and receiving a punishment her lawyers said was out of line for the offense, an emotional Ms. Griner apologized “for my mistake that I made and the embarrassment that I brought on them.” She added: “I hope in your ruling it does not end my life.”Her supporters had largely stayed quiet for weeks after her arrest, but that approach changed in May once the State Department designated her as unlawfully detained. A separate trade, Marine veteran Trevor Reed for a Russian pilot convicted in the U.S. in a cocaine trafficking conspiracy, Konstantin Yaroshenko, spurred hope that additional exchanges could be in the works.Mr. Whelan has been held in Russia since December 2018. The American government also classified him as wrongfully detained. He was sentenced in 2020 to 16 years in prison.Mr. Whelan was not included in the Reed prisoner swap, escalating pressure on the Biden administration to ensure that any deal that brought home Ms. Griner also included him.

Griner Freed from Russian Penal Colony in Trade for Notorious Arms Dealer

Griner Freed from Russian Penal Colony in Trade for Notorious Arms Dealer

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