(Moscow) The Kremlin on Friday lifted a corner of the veil on the Russians freed as part of a historic prisoner swap with the West, acknowledging that some of them were agents working for its intelligence services.
The West and Russia on Thursday carried out the largest prisoner swap since the end of the Cold War, including American journalist Evan Gershkovich and former Marine Paul Whelan, who were freed by Moscow and welcomed in the evening by US President Joe Biden near Washington.
Also read “Relief and criticism for prisoner exchange”
Mr. Whelan and Mr. Gershkovich, along with Russian-American journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, arrived in San Antonio, Texas, on Friday to undergo medical examinations at a U.S. military hospital.
The deal released 16 people held in Russia and Belarus in exchange for eight Russians held in the United States, Germany, Poland, Slovenia and Norway, as well as the two children of a spy couple.
“Good night”
Among the Russians who were released was Vadim Krasikov, who was serving a life sentence in Germany for the murder of a Georgian from the Chechen minority who fought against Russian forces between 2000 and 2004.
On Friday, Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov acknowledged that Vadim Krasikov was “a member of the FSB.”
“He served in Alfa,” an elite FSB unit, he told reporters. “He served with several employees [actuels] of the security service of President Vladimir Putin, Mr Peskov added.
As for the couple formed by Artiom Doultsev and Anna Doultseva, released by Slovenia where they had settled in 2017 with Argentinian passports, Mr. Perskov confirmed their membership in the Russian services.
The children of the illegal immigrants who flew in yesterday only found out they were Russian when the plane took off from Ankara. They don’t speak Russian.
Dmitry Peskov, spokesman for the Russian presidency
In the lexicon of espionage, “clandestines” are agents living under another identity abroad, to carry out their missions.
The couple’s minor children, who had been placed in foster care by social services after their parents’ arrest, were greeted with a “buenas noches” by Vladimir Putin as they got off the plane in Moscow on Thursday evening.
“They didn’t even know who Putin was. This is how the underground workers work and make such sacrifices,” the presidential spokesman said.
Mr Peskov also ruled out any immediate progress in negotiations over the Ukraine conflict following the exchange, stressing that the two processes followed “completely different” principles.
” Save lives ”
Three of the former American detainees – Evan Gershkovich, Paul Whelan and Russian-American journalist Alsu Kurmasheva – were welcomed by Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris at Andrews Air Force Base, where their plane landed around 11:40 p.m. (11:40 p.m. Eastern Time).
Mr. Gershkovich, a reporter for the Wall Street Journal, had been detained since March 2023. Alsu Kurmasheva was also imprisoned in Russia, as was Paul Whelan, who has been imprisoned since late 2018 for espionage.
At the White House, surrounded by the families of the freed Americans, Joe Biden had earlier praised the “courageous and bold decisions” of European allies to make this “historic” exchange possible, praising the “important concessions” made by Germany and the coordination of Turkey.
For German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, the decision to release Vadim Krassikov was “difficult”, but it “saved lives”. This vast exchange was a “diplomatic feat”, Joe Biden also welcomed.
The White House also revealed that it worked for months to free the Kremlin’s former arch-enemy, Alexei Navalny, before he died in February in an Arctic prison in unclear circumstances.
Thursday’s exchange is the first between Moscow and the West since the release in late 2022 of American basketball player Brittney Griner, detained in Russia on drug charges, in exchange for notorious Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, imprisoned in the United States.
For its part, Paris called on Moscow on Friday to immediately release the other people who are still “arbitrarily detained in Russia”, in particular the Frenchman Laurent Vinatier, a collaborator of a Swiss NGO arrested in early June and accused of collecting intelligence on the Russian army.
Dmitry Oreschkin, an independent political analyst based in Riga, said “neither side won” in Thursday’s exchange.
“It’s a draw […]”Putin would never have authorized a deal that could be interpreted as a success for America, Germany or the West in general,” he told AFP.