Wall Street Journal journalist Evan Gershkovich, who had been imprisoned in Russia for more than a year, was freed Thursday after a prisoner swap between the United States and Russia.
The swap also included businessman and former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, and Vladimir Kara-Murza, a British-Russian dissident and Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist.
The Washington Post reported, “In the largest prisoner exchange since the height of the Cold War, officials of the United States, Russia, Germany and other countries met on an airfield tarmac in Ankara, Turkey, on Thursday and were swapping at least two dozen people, the Turkish presidency said — capping months of painstaking diplomacy involving negotiations at the highest levels of multiple governments.”
Gershkovich was arrested in March 2023 on trumped up charges of espionage. Both the Journal and the U.S. government considered Gershkovich to be unlawfully detained. After a sham trial last month, which included no public evidence of the accusations, Gershkovich was sentenced to 16 years in prison.
The New York Times wrote, “The deal seemed sure to prompt jubilation among Western nations that had condemned the charges against Mr. Gershkovich and others as baseless and politically motivated. And it could deliver a diplomatic victory for President Biden, who has long pledged to bring home imprisoned Americans and to support Russia’s embattled pro-democracy movement.”
The Times added, “It was a triumph of a different sort for President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, who can use the deal to highlight his loyalty to Russian agents who get arrested abroad. But the deal also carries risks for him, by releasing an imprisoned politician who could energize Russia’s moribund, exiled opposition.”
The headline in The Wall Street Journal said, “WSJ Reporter Evan Gershkovich Is Free.”
After the swap, President Joe Biden said, “The deal that secured their freedom was a feat of diplomacy. Some of these women and men have been unjustly held for years. All have endured unimaginable suffering and uncertainty. Today, their agony is over.”
In a statement, the Committee to Protect Journalists CEO Jodie Ginsberg said, “Evan and Alsu have been apart from their families for far too long. They were detained and sentenced on spurious charges intended to punish them for their journalism and stifle independent reporting. Their reported release is welcome — but it does not change the fact that Russia continues to suppress a free press. Moscow needs to release all jailed journalists and end its campaign of using in absentia arrest warrants and sentences against exiled Russian journalists.”
This story is developing and will be updated.
