Paul Whelan, a former marine held by the Russians for an alleged espionage crime, released from a prisoner swap

Griner’s release has brought attention to another American still being held by the Russians: Paul Whelan, who has been detained since 2018 on what the US government says are spurious espionage changes. Whelan has denied the allegations. He was taken to a prison hospital in November.

“I was arrested for a crime that never occurred,” he said from the penal colony where he is being held in a remote part of Russia. “I don’t understand why I’m still sitting here.”

The release comes as a result of a prisoner swap between Russia and the United States in which former US Marine, Trevor Reed, was released. The Biden administration was trying to obtain the freedom of two American prisoners, one of which was Paul Whelan, who was held by Russia for alleged espionage. CNN originally reported in July that the Biden administration had offered a potential deal for a prisoner swap involving Bout and some of his associates.

This was not a situation where we could have chosen which American to bring home. A senior administration official told reporters on Thursday that they chose between bringing home one person, or not.

The American people are not back to square one in the negotiations for Paul Whelan’s release, and we need an airplane to get me home

“I was led to believe that things were moving in the right direction, and that the governments were negotiating and that something would happen fairly soon,” he said.

There’s a lot of concerns because it’s not true. And they’re trying to get out of United States, what the United States may not be able to provide, but this is basically political extortion,” he said.

Whelan also noted that the war in Ukraine has created intense mistrust among the other prisoners about Americans, and with the Russians “saying that I’m a general in the US military, that I’m a spy, a secret agent with the DIA, that’s left me in a very precarious situation, because people look at me in a very dangerous time and say, ‘well, you’re one of them.’”

“If a message could go to the president, that the situation is precarious and needs to be fixed fast,” he said. My bags have been packed. I’m ready to go home. I need an airplane to get me.

“Sadly, for totally illegitimate reasons, Russia is treating Paul’s case differently than Brittney’s,” Biden said. We do not give up, despite the fact we have not succeeded in securing Paul’s release. We will never give up.”

National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications John Kirby said Thursday that the US is “not back to square one” in its negotiations for Whelan’s release.

Paul Whelan: Trying to Make the Most Out of What Russia is and what I need to get out of it (with an appendix by Britney Griner)

I just want to tell how Russia is and not try to light a negative light on it. I’m trying to get a message through to my governments that I need help,” he said.

He said that he is willing to take the risk because he thinks the message needs to get out. “And I’ve kind of sat quietly by for a long time, and at this point I’m frustrated that nothing’s being done, and I just don’t know what roadmap people are looking at to get me home,” Whelan said.

Whelan told CNN that he was concerned that he might not make it out, and that how he would come back was unknown.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/08/politics/paul-whelan-cnn-interview-brittney-griner/index.html

Inmates, prisoners, and other inmates in Russia: the case of Alexandru Grigoryevich Griner, 32, who was arrested on February 17, 2022

“We only have cold water. Everywhere has a dirty appearance. There really isn’t any maintenance. A lot of things are 30-40 years old, and they don’t work. We don’t have cleaning supplies. The medical care isn’t very good. He said that we are on our own to take care of ourselves.

Whelan said he tries to keep sane by reading “a lot of books” and writing letters. He said he likes to receive letters and cards because they make him remember that our world still exists.

Griner, 32, was arrested on February 17, 2022, after having less than a gram of cannabis oil in her luggage while at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport and Russian authorities accused her of smuggling significant amounts of a narcotic substance, which the Russian government says is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

There had been concern about the health and well being of a Black and gay person who was imprisoned in Russia. Homophobia and discrimination remains despite Russia decriminalizing homosexuality in 1993. On Monday, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed into law a bill that expanded anti-LGBTQ laws.

Political prisoners are sometimes put in harsh conditions where they can be imprisoned for up to 15 years or put in psychiatric units, according to the US State Department. Russian law also allows forced labor in penal colonies, and in some cases, inmates have been tortured to death, the report says. There also are reports of prison authorities recruiting inmates to abuse other inmates, the report also says.

The Prisoner Exchange with Russian Grandmaster Martensen Griner and Kirby: Implications for Medical Quality in the United States and Beyond

The prisoner exchange with Griner was “completed successfully at Abu Dhabi Airport” on Thursday, Russian state media said. In a statement, Saudi Arabia and the U. A.D. said that they were involved in mediation efforts leading to the prisoner swap.

President Joe Biden gave final approval for the prisoner swap freeing Griner over the past week, an official familiar with the matter has told CNN, adding that the president was updated on the swap as it took place.

After months of talks, the agreement to release Griner was reached in the last few days, according to senior administration officials who told reporters on a conference call.

Swapping an American jailed for a minor drugs offense in Russia for one of the world’s most notorious arms traffickers known as “The Merchant of Death” might seem like a lopsided deal that could fuel dangerous national security precedents.

Though White House officials have said Griner is in “good spirits” she is likely to undergo a thorough medical evaluation. John Kirby told CNN that the first priority right now is to make sure that she gets the right care when she is imprisoned and under intolerable conditions.

We think that there will be a need for her to have access to health care before she can return to her hometown. Kirby said that it would take a very long time. The doctors will work with the family on that. That is going to be the main focus now, is just making sure that we look after her well being before she’s able to, you know, to get on her way.”

Bout in Bangkok: From the First US Basketball Player to the Kremlin — A Conversation with Bout and the Mystique of the Lion of War

It is the most uneven of swaps at the most unlikely of times, but perhaps the intense pressure of this moment is why the exchange of a US basketball star for a Russian arms dealer ended up happening now.

But the circumstances and political pressure on both sides reversed this imbalance. Griner gained a significance to Americans – based on her claims of innocence and her blatant seizure as a geopolitical pawn on the eve of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – that mandated the Biden administration to begin negotiations with the Kremlin at the worst point of US-Russian relations since at least the end of the Cold War.

I interviewed Bout in 2009 after months of negotiations while he was imprisoned in Bangkok. He is a charming polyglot who can talk for hours about his relationships with politicians around the world.

I have seen videos of Bout in the Congo and across Africa, where he was pretty close to the conflicts there. He is accused, by multiple analysts and UN investigations, of proliferating small arms across that continent during the 90s and early 00s, which he denied. He denied the accusations that he had armed al Qaeda. He was accused of doing things and denied some of them. He was the focus of a movie starring Nicolas Cage called “Lord of War.”

For sure, he is a pilot and an entrepreneur. He had a past with the Soviets. He worked for Russian intelligence in order to bolster Moscow’s strategic objectives in the world and he was an asset to their supply of weapons around the world. There were reports that he served with Russians who are close to the president. The Americans sought him with an intensity that may have been explained by this. He was never a nobody.

There was always a curious mystique to Bout and his entourage. He would say he was innocent of everything. He has had an interesting life. When people know there is more to a story than they are telling, you get the wink-wink.

The Invasion of Ukrainian and Russian Civil Liberation Forces in the Cold War and the Russia-Russia Relations between the United States and Russia

During the Russian invasion and brutalizing of Ukrainian, how this exchange happened is more surprising. It says two things: that Moscow and Washington are able to do business even as Russian bombs kill innocent Ukrainian civilians, and the United States provides arms to Ukraine that are killing Russian soldiers, and that nuclear powers can work on other thorny issues while bullets are flying. This is good for everyone on the planet. It means some cool heads prevail, and basic interests win out.

It shows weakness in Putin’s side. He is agreeing to a high-profile diplomatic deal in order to get a figure that is outsized and important to Russia’s elite, the intelligence community and national pride.

Many ordinary Russians may not know that this man is very important to the Russian elite. He is not the kind of person who would be willing to leave behind the bodies of hundreds of soldiers that have remained strewn on the battlefield.

These are the very people that Putin wants to curry favor with now. The deal may also have been more self-serving: Many believe that when Bout served in Africa, he had close ties to members of the Russian elite now close to Putin (though Bout has denied this too). Was it because the US spent a lot of money to detain him? Did they think he would turn? We may never know.

When Cherelle spoke with President Joe Biden about her wife’s release from Russia, he informed her that she was now safe out of the country.

A U.S. Prisoner Swap for Bout: How to Bring a Humanely Held in a Russian Penal Colony?

The U.S. government is hesitant about prisoner swaps because they fear it will encourage the imprisonment of more Americans abroad. The exchange for Bout shouldn’t be viewed as a change in normal practice, but instead as an attempt to find another alternative, according to a Biden official.

The official said the administration felt a “moral obligation,” as well as a policy obligation, to bring people who are being held hostage or detained home.

“How is it possible for someone to be put through a sham trial and sentenced to imprisonment in a Russian Penal Colony, in horrible circumstances, that they did not deserve?” The official said that they regarded that as unacceptable.

Cherelle Griner said she was overwhelmed by emotions, expressing gratitude to Biden, Vice President Harris and other members of the administration involved in securing her wife’s release. She thanked the WNBA, Griner’s agent and others.

She was sentenced last August by a Russian court to nine years in prison for carrying less than a gram of hash oil into Russia when she arrived in February of this year for play in the Russian women’s professional basketball league. Last month, she was transferred to a prison colony in Mordovia — 300 miles southeast of Moscow — to begin serving out her sentence.

In court, Griner admitted to mistakenly packing two vape cartridges in her rush to pack her luggage — but provided documents that showed the hash oil was legally prescribed by her U.S. doctor for pain management.

One of the Americans held in Russia is returning to the States, and the Biden administration plans to continue its efforts to get another released.

There are other American prisoners in Russia. The family of US teacher Marc Fogel, who is serving a 14 year sentence at a hard labor camp, has also called for the White House to negotiate his release. Fogel was arrested last year in Moscow after traveling into the country with cannabis that his lawyer said was used for medical purposes.

During the month of November, 52 year-old Corbett was briefly moved from a prison colony to a prison hospital. He spoke to his family last Friday, after a week of silence that had prompted concern in the White House over his whereabouts and condition.

“He is probably as well as you could be in a Russian labor camp,” his twin brother David told NPR in April. They don’t provide nutrition, and they don’t take much care of the prisoners. There’s a lot of abuse. I think he tries to stay out of people’s way.

Biden stressed that efforts to secure Whelan’s release are ongoing, and said his administration is in close touch with Whelan’s family (the U.S. official said Biden intends to speak with them too).

They said in a statement the US had given them advance notice of the prisoner swap and that it was different in April.

“That early warning has given our family time to prepare for what is now a public disappointment for us,” David said in the Detroit News. And a disaster for Paul. I do not know if he is aware yet, although he will surely learn from Russian media. Our parents have had calls with him every day since his return to IK-17 on December 2d, and they will surely speak to him soon.”

Despite the disappointment, Whelan’s brother said he is happy for Griner and her loved ones, adding that “there is no greater success than for a wrongful detainee to be freed and for them to go home.”

“Brittney will soon be back in the arms of her loved ones and – and she should have been there all along,” the president said from the Roosevelt Room, where he was joined by Griner’s wife. “This is a day we’ve worked toward for a long time.”

He said that Paul Whelan was let down at least three times by 2 Presidents. The campaign of Paul’s deserves better from his government, and implores President Biden to use all the tools available to get him back.

Editor’s Note: Peter Bergen is CNN’s national security analyst, a vice president at New America and a professor of practice at Arizona State University. Bergen’s book is ” The Cost of Chaos: The Trump Administration and the World.” The views expressed in this commentary are his own. CNN has more opinion on it.

We used to think primarily of American hostages being taken by terrorist groups like ISIS or al Qaeda, but in the past few years we have seen an increase in governments taking Americans as de facto hostages, according to a recent report by the James W. Foley Legacy Foundation, which advocates for Americans who are held hostage and “wrongful detainees.”

Griner is simply the most famous example of this and has served to bring the issue to the attention of many who otherwise might not have been aware of the dangers that face Americans who travel to countries such as Russia, China, Iran and Venezuela – countries that are known to detain Americans to gain leverage over the United States.

Consider the case of a man named Mark Frerichs who was held for over two years by the Taliban in Afghanistan. Frerichs was released in exchange for clemency for Haji Bashir Noorzai, who was in prison in the US on drug trafficking charges for 17 years. According to the Bush administration, one of the most wanted drug dealers was Noorzai. The release of Noorzai was long sought by the Taliban, who regard him as a key ally.

Some people think about the case of the seven Americans who were jailed in Venezuela for a long time and were exchanged two months ago for some people who had been jailed in the US for conspiring to smuggle cocaine. Both of the convicted drug dealers are nephews of Venezuela’s first lady.

Biden-Giner Whelan decision and its consequences for the international community and the American Civil Liberties Organization (CFT). The case of B.D. Griner

What will be the price of releasing Whelan? Surely, it won’t be nothing. And, again, the Biden administration will have to make a tough call about what price it is willing to pay.

Because of the matter’s exceedingly high profile, it was certain those conditions had been set by Russian President Vladimir Putin himself, one US official said.

In July, Griner wrote a letter to Biden saying she was “terrified I might be here forever.” She wanted him to do everything he could to bring her home. At the White House, Biden met with Griner’s wife for the first time to show her the letter he was sending in response.

But any victory would be tempered by the inability to secure Whelan’s freedom and inevitable blowback over the release of one the most prolific arms dealers of the past decades.

The situation was complicated further when senior law enforcement officials, angry at the prospect of releasing a notorious figure it had taken years to capture and alarmed by the precedent Bout’s release would set, raised strong objections.

Moments earlier in Abu Dhabi, Griner had stepped from her transport plane into the Middle East air – fifty degrees warmer than Moscow – and smiled, a US official said.

The wife of a man who was in Washington was invited to a White House meeting on Thursday. Jake Sullivan, the national security adviser, had briefed her several times over the course of the negotiations.

Griner’s flight to freedom marked a moment officials acknowledged was only the first step of what will likely be a difficult and emotionally jarring process for the professional athlete in the weeks and months ahead. A range of support programs, developed across the US government over years to address the needs of detainees and hostages returning to US, have been prepared for Griner to utilize.

He said that she needs space, privacy and time with her family to recover from the trauma and the loss of months of her life.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/08/politics/biden-griner-whelan-decision/index.html

Bout vs. Saudi Arabia: Resolving the diplomatic triumph of the U.S. trade deal with Saudi Arabia in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks

A senior administration official said the US had “tried to articulate other options, other categories of options, to create the space to really have the haggling that we want to have,” describing the other categories as involving individuals in US custody.

The official said that if you’re haggling, you’re getting closer. We have not had any change in the way we respond to a demand for something that is not ours to provide because it’s not something in our control.

One reality the assessment took into account, the official said, is the fact that Bout has been in prison for over a decade and has not been actively engaged in any recent criminal activity.

An official wouldn’t say how the US was certain that the Russian arms dealer wouldn’t pose a future risk to the country, but they did say that the security assessment conducted on Bout was thorough.

That added to concerns that the deal increases the likelihood that Russia, Iran and other countries could use the arrest of Americans to try to use the publicity to gain concessions the US otherwise wouldn’t give.

Speaking Thursday, an administration official rejected the notion that Bout’s release set a new precedent for securing the release of Americans and said hostile governments would be mistaken if they interpreted Thursday’s swap that way.

A government official said that governments around the world wouldn’t be wise to draw an inference that this has become the norm. “But in the rare case when there is an imperative to Americans home, which is a real priority for this president, there sometimes are no alternatives left, and a heavy price has to be paid.”

It was a tragic counterpoint to the diplomatic triumph that Biden was unable to secure the release of another American prisoner in a Russian prison. top Republicans accused him of placing priority to a basketball star over an ex-marine, who was also involved in the campaign against Biden.

Another notable cog in this deal was Saudi Arabia, which helped facilitate the exchange alongside the United Arab Emirates – and also helped secure the release of US citizens captured fighting in Ukraine earlier this year. While the kingdom has good relations with both Moscow and Washington and is hoping to increase its leadership role, it remains to be seen if it will become a bridge between Russia and the U.S. Biden was going to travel to Saudi Arabia earlier this year to greet the ruthless Crown Prince Mohammed bin Sultan and it may have been in a different light after the recent smoothing of US-Russia exchanges.

It is impossible to not have a sour aftertaste when dealing with someone like Putin. But it is the job of a president to weigh these competing dynamics within the context of America’s national goals and duty to its citizens.

This adds another layer of complication for Biden as he seeks to get Whelan free, since it involves another government and would require German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to potentially agree to supersede his country’s own legal system. The new German leader’s ability to do so is questionable and there is a kind of Russian concession Berlin might need.

The senior administration official told CNN that the United States needs to give something more to the Russians than what they have so far.

Administration officials insisted that Biden got the best deal he could get after he was accused of doing a bad deal.

The Farkas Problem: Why Putin isn’t Handing over Whelan? What Donald Trump Needs to Know about War in the Middle East

Evelyn Farkas, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense, told CNN she thought Putin was never going to hand over Whelan and all along wanted to swap only Griner for Bout.

The current situation is happening because Putin wants this to happen now, he needs a win, and he is having trouble convincing Russia people that it is a good idea to be at war withUkraine.

The political divide in the United States that now challenges every US foreign policy decision was not over until after Griner was freed, along with a backlash against her on social media.

The congressman from Florida called the deal to free Griner “shameful” and accused the administration of giving priority to a celebrity over a veteran.

“I think the challenge this points to is these regimes know this. This is why (President Nicolas) Maduro traded five Citgo executives – who were lured to Venezuela to get arrested – for his nephews who are convicted drug traffickers,” Rubio said.

“The reason the Iranian regime, the Taliban, Putin himself, continue to take Americans hostage is we continue to make concessions. When do we start to dictate the terms to the regimes?

“We tend to always look at what is Russia getting out of this? … We’re getting an American back in his home. It’s something to celebrate.”