2024-08-02 05:17:40
A plane carrying three freed Americans, including journalist Evan Gershkovich and former US Marine Paul Whelan, landed at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland late on Thursday as part of a massive prisoner exchange deal involving multiple nations, which saw 26 prisoners being released.
Gershkovich, Whelan and Russian-American journalist Alsu Kurmasheva were freed on Thursday by Russia as part of the biggest prisoner swap since the end of the Cold War.
All three American detainees were warmly welcomed and received by US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. They were also greeted and hugged by families who had tears of joy and relief as they saw them after a long time. “Welcome home,” Biden told the released detainees.
According to the White House, the US had negotiated the prisoner swap with Russia, Germany and three other countries. The agreement, negotiated in secrecy in Turkey’s Ankara for over a year, had 26 prisoners, including 16 of those coming to the West from Russia and eight being sent back to Russia from the West.
The families of the released detainees had an emotional moment at the Oval Office as they spoke to their loved ones by phone.
In a brief conversation, Biden told the three Americans that they were detained “wrongfully” and “we were overwhelmed” that they returned home.
“We just want to say how overwhelmed we are. You’ve been wrongfully detained for a long time, and we are glad you are home,” Biden told the released detainees as the families stood around the presidential Resolute Desk.
“Every parent, child, spouse and loved one who joined me in the Oval Office today has been praying for this day for a long time,” he said.
In an emotional conversation, the mother of Gershkovich, a Wall Street Journal reporter based in Russia, told her son over the phone that it was her speaking.
“This is momma. Do you hear me? It’s your mom,” Gershkovich’s mother told her son over the phone. The entire moment was captured in a two-minute video posted on the X handle of Biden’s office.
Gershkovich was arrested in March last year on espionage charges, which he and the US government vehemently denied. He was subsequently sentenced to 16 years in a high-security Russian prison.
Whelan, a former Marine who was working as a corporate security executive from Michigan, was detained in Moscow in 2018 and convicted on espionage charges. He has been serving a 16-year sentence in a Russian prison. Whelan and the US government have denied that he is a spy, and Washington has designated him as “wrongfully detained”.
Kurmasheva, an editor with Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), a media organisation funded by the US government, travelled to Russia in May last year to meet her mother. However, she was temporarily detained by Russian authorities while waiting for her return flight and her dual US and Russian passports were confiscated, USAToday reported.
The 47-year-old was initially fined for failing to register her US passport with Russian authorities. However, she was arrested and charged in October for “failing to register herself as a foreign agent”.
She was subsequently sentenced to six and a half years in prison on July 19, 2024, on charges of spreading false information about the Russian Army.
(with inputs from Reuters)
