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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
World
Helen Sullivan (now); Léonie Chao-Fong and Lili Bayer (earlier)

Biden says ‘welcome home’ as Americans land in the US – as it happened

Evan Gershkovich United States Russia Prison Wall Street Journal
Reporter Evan Gershkovich is greeted on the tarmac by his mother, Ella Milman, left, as President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris look on at Andrews Air Force Base.
Reporter Evan Gershkovich is greeted on the tarmac by his mother, Ella Milman, left, as President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris look on at Andrews Air Force Base. Photograph: Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP

This blog is now closed. You can read the latest story here:

Here are the highlights:

The Guardian’s Andrew Roth has posted this response Gershkovich have to questions about political prisoners who have not been freed:

Updated

Summary

Here is a summary of the extraordinary last few hours:

  • The plane carrying prisoners freed from Russia in return for the release of Russian detainees, in the largest exchange in decades, arrived at Joint Airbase Andrews in the US late on Thursday night. Sixteen people were freed from Russian custody, including the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich. Several other foreign citizens held in Russia and numerous political prisoners were also freed. It is the largest prisoner swap between Washington and Moscow since the cold war.

  • Joe Biden said it “feels wonderful” to welcome the freed Americans to US soil. The president gave special credit to nations including Germany and Slovenia for helping to make the global prisoner swap work, saying they agreed to difficult things that were “against their self-interests”.

  • Speaking on the tarmac, Biden rejected the idea that such swaps could lead to other Americans being detained. “I don’t buy this idea of ... let these people rot in jail because other people may be captured. The vice-president, Kamala Harris, called the deal an “extraordinary testament to the importance of having a president who understands the power of diplomacy”.

  • The exchange took place at Ankara airport in Turkey on Thursday in a complicated operation in which planes arrived from and departed to multiple countries.

  • Among those freed by Russia are Gershkovich, the former US marine Paul Whelan and the journalist and joint US-Russian citizen Alsu Kurmasheva. Shortly after their release the US government put out the first picture of the three holding the stars and stripes. Biden gave Whelan the flag pin off his own lapel when he greeted him.

  • The Wall Street Journal’s editor-in-chief, Emma Tucker, called it a “joyous day”.
    “While we waited for this momentous day, we were determined to be as loud as we could be on Evan’s behalf. We are so grateful for all the voices that were raised when his was silent. We can finally say, in unison, ‘Welcome home, Evan,’” she wrote in a letter posted online.

  • Some prisoners freed from Russia and Belarus in a major swap had feared for their lives, said the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, after he met a group of the detainees on their arrival in Germany. Germany is receiving 12 detainees. These include five who hold German nationality, including some dual nationals. Among them is Rico Krieger, a German who was sentenced to death in Belarus on espionage charges before a reprieve this week.

  • Brittney Griner, the US basketball star who was imprisoned in Russia for 10 months before her release in 2022 as part of a prisoner exchange, said she is “head over heels” that fellow Americans are coming home from Russia. “Great day. It’s a great day. It’s a great day,” Griner said after the US women beat Belgium in the Paris Olympic quarter-finals.

  • The exchange also included the release of the Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin and several other opposition figures including the British-Russian politician Vladimir Kara-Murza, and three people who had worked for the opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in prison. Navalny was meant to be a part of the exchange deal before his death in February, the US national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, told reporters.

  • Several deep-cover Russian “illegal” spies arrested in Norway and Slovenia were swapped, along with Russians held on criminal charges in US jails. Here is the full list of people who were involved in the prisoner exchange between Russia and the west.

  • The US president, Joe Biden, said the exchange deal was made possible by a “feat of diplomacy and friendship”. He thanked Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Norway and Turkey. The swap is likely to be considered a political coup for Biden in the waning months of his presidency, and a blow to Donald Trump, who claimed on the 2024 campaign trail that he would be the one to free Gershkovich.

Updated

More pictures:

Gershkovich, who was detained for just under 500 days on espionage charges in Russia, was met by his mother, Ella, father, Mikhail, and his sister Danielle.

Gershkovich’s family said earlier in a statement: “We have waited 491 days for Evan’s release, and it’s hard to describe what today feels like. We can’t wait to give him the biggest hug and see his sweet and brave smile up close. Most important now is taking care of Evan and being together again. No family should have to go through this, and so we share relief and joy today with Paul and Alsu’s families.”

Whelan, who was detained in 2018 on espionage charges and served more than five years in pre-trial detention and then a labour colony, was met by his sister Ellen.

“Paul Whelan is not in a Russian labour colony any longer, but he is not home,” his family wrote in a statement. “While Paul was wrongfully imprisoned in Russia, he lost his home. He lost his job. We are unsure how someone overcomes these losses and rejoins society after being a hostage. We are grateful for everyone’s efforts to help Paul while he was away. We hope you will continue to help him by providing Paul the space and privacy he needs as he rebuilds his life. It is Paul’s story to tell and he will tell it when he is able.”

Kurmasheva, who was arrested on charges of failing to register herself as a foreign agent and then charged with spreading false information about the Russian military, had been sentenced to more than six years in prison. The Radio Free Europe journalist was met by her husband, Pavel Butorin, and her two children, Bibi and Miriam.

Among those returning to Russia was the assassin Vadim Krasikov, who had been held in a German prison since 2019 for the murder of a Chechen exile in Berlin. Additionally, several deep-cover Russian “illegal” spies arrested in Norway and Slovenia were swapped, along with Russians held on criminal charges in US jails.

Updated

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have met Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and two other freed American prisoners after Washington and Moscow completed their largest prisoner exchange since the cold war.

On a muggy evening at Andrews air force base near Washington DC, Gershkovich and the other freed prisoners, ex-marine Paul Whelan and journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, disembarked a Bombardier jet from Turkey and were met by their families and the US president and vice-president.

Hundreds of journalists came to the base to catch their first glimpse of the freed detainees who, combined, had spent nearly a decade in Russian captivity. They were among 16 American, Russian dissident and German prisoners freed by Russia, in exchange for eight Russians freed by the US, Germany, Norway, Slovenia and Poland. Those returning to Russia included a number of undercover spies and a convicted Russian FSB assassin whom Vladimir Putin had obsessively sought to free from a German prison for years.

Updated

Here are some pictures from that emotional arrival:

Biden gave Paul Whelan the American flag pin from his lapel

From the Associated Press:

On a warm, steamy night, the freed Americans lingered on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews to soak up the moment of their return to the US

They took selfies with family members and friends, shared hugs with Biden and Harris, patted loved ones on the back and smothered them with kisses.

At one point, Biden gave Paul Whelan the flag pin off his own lapel.

Updated

The motorcade is leaving the airbase.

Updated

The Wall Street Journal’s editor-in-chief, Emma Tucker, called it a “joyous day”.

“While we waited for this momentous day, we were determined to be as loud as we could be on Evan’s behalf. We are so grateful for all the voices that were raised when his was silent. We can finally say, in unison, ‘Welcome home, Evan,’” she wrote in a letter posted online.

Updated

Joe Biden said it “feels wonderful” to welcome the freed Americans to US soil.

He gave special credit to countries including Germany and Slovenia for helping to make the global prisoner swap work, saying they agreed to difficult things that were “against their self-interests”.

Speaking on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews, Biden rejected the idea that such swaps could lead to other Americans being detained. “I don’t buy this idea of ... let these people rot in jail because other people may be captured.”

Kamala Harris called the deal an “extraordinary testament to the importance of having a president who understands the power of diplomacy”.

Updated

From the New York Times’ Katie Rogers: Evan Gershkovich is the last of the released prisoners to go to the motorcade. He declines to answer more questions. “Family time,” he says.

Updated

Here is more of what Harris had to say:

Harris says: “It’s a very good night.”

Updated

Biden told the released Americans “Welcome home” he says on MSNBC.

“My father used to say family is the beginning the middle and the end, it’s about who we are as a country”. To Putin he has this to say: “Stop.”

“To me this is about the essence of who we are as a country,” Biden said.

Then he made a joke about being president for another 90 days. “You’re stuck with me kid.”

Updated

Interviewed on MSNBC, Harris is careful to keep the spotlight on Biden:

Gershkovich and Wall Street Journal editor in chief, Emma Tucker, are hugging now.

There are shouts of “The Journal is over here, the Journal is over here” and he walks over. Hugs all round – and then he takes a phone call. Weird day at work.

Updated

Gershkovich gives one of his colleagues a big hug – and is then interviewed.

The three freed Americans are standing around, chatting to family now. Alsu Kurmasheva’s family takes a selfie. The journalists are calling Gershkovich over.

Updated

Next up is Alsu Kurmasheva, who greets Biden and Harris, then runs to her children, taking them into her arms.

Gershkovich now walks up to his mother and hugs and kisses her, lifting her off the ground.

Updated

Next up is Evan Gershkovich, who puts his arm around Biden. The press pool cheers and whoops.

First off the plane is Paul Whelan, who gives a salute.

Whelan, 54, is a retired US marine who was arrested in 2018.

Russian authorities arrested Whelan – a corporate security executive from Michigan – at a hotel in Moscow on accusations that he was part of an intelligence-gathering operation.

He received a 16-year prison sentence in 2020. He insists that the evidence against him was falsified.

Updated

The plane door is opening, and Biden and Harris are waiting at the bottom of the stairs.

Harris and Biden are walking across the tarmac now.

The plane has pulled up right in front of the area where journalists are waiting (they were provided with earplugs and warned it would be coming pretty close).

Plane carrying Gershkovich, other freed prisoners, touches down in Maryland

The plane carrying prisoners freed from Russia in return for the release of Russian detainees, in the largest such exchange in decades, has touched down at Joint Airbase Andrews.

Sixteen people were freed from Russian custody, including the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich. Several other foreign citizens held in Russia and numerous political prisoners were also freed.

The exchange took place at Ankara airport on Thursday in a complicated operation in which planes arrived from and departed to multiple countries.

Among those freed by Russia are Gershkovich, the former US marine Paul Whelan and the journalist and joint US-Russian citizen Alsu Kurmasheva. Shortly after their release the US government put out the first picture of the three holding the stars and stripes.

Updated

The Wall Street Journal’s editor-in-chief, Emma Tucker, is there:

Both the president, Joe Biden, and his vice-president and presumptive Democratic nominee, Kamala Harris, are going to greet the freed prisoners.

Updated

The White House motorcade has arrived:

More from the Guardian’s Global Affairs correspondent, Andrew Roth, who is at Joint Airbase Andrews:

More than a hundred journalists are at Andrews air force base to watch as freed American prisoners Evan Gershkovich, Paul Whelan and Alsu Kurmasheva arrive. They’ll be reunited with their families and will also be met by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

Air force personnel are handing out earplugs, telling journalists the Bombardier jet carrying the prisoners will be “very close”.

Journalists are discussing how the freed detainees will be feeling and what their next steps will be after undergoing a debriefing. Gershkovich, the Wall Street Journal reporter, is set to depart for Texas after stopping at the base. Both airbase personnel and journalists are not sure if Biden or Harris, the presumptive nominee, is set to give remarks.

Updated

The Guardian’s Global Affairs correspondent, Andrew Roth, is at Joint Airbase Andrews:

At the top of this blog you will see a livestream from the Joint Airbase Andrews where Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are scheduled to meet the freed US prisoners as they arrive.

Next up: Trevor Reed and Konstantin Yaroshenko.

The exchange of Reed and Yaroshenko was notable because it came amid soaring tensions only two months after Russia started its full-scale war in Ukraine.

Reed, an ex-Marine, was arrested in 2019 in Moscow for allegedly assaulting police while drunk. Reed denied the allegations and then-US ambassador John Sullivan said the case was so preposterous that “even the judge laughed”, but Reed got a sentence of nine years.

Yaroshenko, a pilot, was arrested in 2010 in Liberia for involvement in a lucrative cocaine distribution scheme. He was extradited to the US and sentenced to 20 years.

The 7 April 2022 exchange took place at an airport in Turkey.

Updated

In decades of prisoner exchanges, those released have included spies, journalists, drug and arms dealers, and even a well-known athlete.

The AP has taken a look at some of the most famous prisoner swaps, starting with Brittney Griner and Viktor Bout.

The 9 December 2022 exchange of the WNBA star for a Russian arms trader nicknamed the “merchant of death” was notable and controversial for the magnitude of its disparities.

Griner had been arrested 10 months earlier on arrival at a Moscow airport when vape canisters containing cannabis oil were found in her luggage. She was convicted of drug charges and sentenced to nine years in prison, a harsh sentence even in low-tolerance Russia.

Bout was arrested in 2008 in a US sting operation in Thailand for offering to sell surface-to-air missiles to men masquerading as Colombian rebels. He eventually was extradited to the United States and convicted of charges, including conspiring to kill US nationals, and sentenced to 25 years.

Griner’s celebrity status made her case highly visible, and the Biden administration worked intensively to win her release, which came at the airport in Abu Dhabi. Critics said Washington had caved in to political pressure by swapping an arms dealer for a famous athlete.

Donald Trump, who during his presidency had also taken an interest in hostages and wrongfully detained Americans, claimed during the June debate with Biden that he would get Gershkovich out as soon as he won the election.

On Thursday, he bashed the deal, suggesting incorrectly on his Truth Social platform that the US had given Russia cash for the deal.

“Are we releasing murderers, killers, or thugs? Just curious because we never make good deals, at anything, but especially hostage swaps,” Trump wrote.

Evan Gershkovich, asked if he had any requests after release, asked Putin if he would be willing to sit down for an interview, the Wall Street Journal reports:

In case you missed this earlier: the Kremlin said Moscow’s decision to pardon and free prisoners had been made to bring Russian captives home. “The decision to sign the [pardon] decrees was made with the aim of returning Russian citizens detained and imprisoned in foreign countries,” it said in a statement.

Updated

Here is Harris on the exchange and her conversation with Yulia Navalnya:

AFP reports that there is controversy in Germany over the release of Vadim Krasikov and other convicted criminals.

Russian citizen Vadim Krasikov had been serving a life sentence for the brazen assassination of a former Chechen rebel commander in the German capital in 2019, a case that shocked the country.

In his press conference celebrating the exchange, the US president, Joe Biden, acknowledged that he “particularly” owed “a great sense of gratitude to chancellor” Olaf Scholz.

The deal “required me to get some significant concessions from Germany, which they originally concluded they could not do because of the person in question”, Biden said.

German channel NTV reported that there had been rows between Scholz’s office and the justice ministry over Krasikov’s case.

According to other reports in the German press, the justice ministry eventually ordered prosecutors to suspend Krasikov’s sentence to enable his deportation.

Some in judicial circles reportedly felt this was a case of inappropriate political meddling in the legal process.

The German section of human rights organisation Amnesty International condemned the “bitter taste” of the deal and the fact that it had created an equivalence between “a murderer … convicted in a fair trial” and “people who have just exercised their right to free speech”.

It raised the spectre of the exchange “broadening impunity” and emboldening the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, who previously said Krasikov acted out of “patriotic sentiments” by “eliminating a bandit”.

An opinion piece in Germany’s Bild tabloid said that while the release of rights activists and German citizens in Russia was to be welcomed, “the perverse message given to the Russian people is that Putin is a hero” for “saving murderers”.

Updated

The Wall Street Journal’s former Washington bureau chief, who worked full time on the release of Evan Gershkovich, has told the New York Times in a text message: “The wonderful thing about today is that Evan for the first time in 16 months will have the chance to decide for himself what to do and when to do it … We think he will need time and space to reconnect with his life in free society and to spend time with his family. But I look forward to the day I can serve him a large glass of scotch.”

Updated

The Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, has called the release of the prisoners “a huge relief”:

Updated

Here is Yulia Navalnya’s statement from earlier today.

She listed the names of “Russians who have been saved from Putin’s regime, and those who are still imprisoned: Daniel Kholodny, Vadim Kobzev, Alexei Liptser and Igor Sergunin:

Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg has welcomed the prisoner release today:

Navalny was a larger-than-life figure whose bravery in confronting Putin, despite the deaths of multiple other Kremlin opponents over the years, amazed Russia watchers around the world.

After surviving an assassination attempt in which he was poisoned with a rare, Soviet-designed nerve agent, and then daring to return from safety in Germany to certain arrest in Russia, Navalny took on an aura of near-invincibility.

His sudden death behind bars shocked the White House team who had been trying to get the other prisoners home.

“The team felt like the wind had been taken out of our sails,” a senior US official told reporters.

When the news broke, national security chief Sullivan said he happened to be with the parents of one of the other key targets in the prisoner swap plan: Evan Gershkovich, a Wall Street Journal reporter arrested in Russia in March 2023.

“On the very day that he died, I saw Evan’s parents,” Sullivan said.

“I told them that the president was determined to get this done, even in light of that tragic news, and that we were going to work day and night to get to this day.”

Back to news about the prisoner swap now. Here is more on what US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan has revealed about efforts to free Alexei Navalny before he died, via AFP:

Amid celebrations at getting a slew of US citizens and Kremlin opponents out of Russian prisons, the White House had one public regret Thursday: failure to get out an even bigger name – Alexei Navalny.

“We had been working with our partners on a deal that would have included Alexei Navalny and, unfortunately, he died,” US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan revealed.

In the White House’s plans, the last truly high-profile political opponent of President Vladimir Putin should have been included in the historic swap that saw 16 people - including three US citizens and a US resident - freed in return for 10 Russians chosen by the Kremlin, including two minors.

But in February 2024, just as the secret international talks were at a crucial stage, Navalny was pronounced dead at a notoriously brutal Russian Arctic prison, where he was serving a 19-year sentence after exposing Kremlin corruption.

Blinken says Edmundo Gonzalez win Venezuela election

We’ll be taking in some broader US politics news now as we await the released Americans’ arrival in Washington.

On that note: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Thursday that Edmundo Gonzalez won the most votes in Venezuela’s 28 July presidential election.

Venezuela’s electoral authority has declared President Nicolas Maduro the winner of the election, a result that has been derided as implausible by the opposition, independent pollsters and many foreign governments.

Here is the Wall Street Journal’s editor-in-chief, Emma Tucker, celebrating the confirmation of her reporter Evan Gershkovich’s release:

Some of the freed prisoners feared for their lives, says German Chancellor Olaf Scholz

Some prisoners freed from Russia and Belarus in a major swap had feared for their lives, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Friday, after meeting a group of the detainees on their arrival in Germany.

Germany is receiving a total of 12 detainees. These include five who hold German nationality, including some dual nationals.

Among them is Rico Krieger, a German who was sentenced to death in Belarus on espionage charges before a reprieve this week.

The German government has defended the decision to free Russian hitman Vadim Krasikov, who assassinated a former Chechen rebel commander, and was a key figure sought by the Russians as part of the deal.

“We are a society that is characterised by... the idea of individual freedom and by democracy,” Scholz said.

“And the fact that those who have to fear for their lives because they have stood up for democracy and freedom can also count on the protection of others is part of our self-image as a democratic... society,” he added.

Updated

Here is Friday’s Guardian front page:

White House flies flag recognizing wrongfully detained Americans

It is the first time such a flag has been flown on the White House grounds.

The flag symbolizes other Americans who continue to be held hostage or are wrongfully detained abroad, according to the White House. It underscores the administration’s “enduring commitment to ensuring the safety and security of our fellow Americans, and our sacred vow to continue working tirelessly until every American is accounted for and returns safely back home.”

Here is the flag being flown at the State Department, too:

Scholz: 'If you had any doubts, then you lose them after speaking with those who are now free'

Chancellor Olaf Scholz welcomed Germans and Russians freed in the prisoner swap to Germany and said he had “very moving” conversations with them.

Scholz said after they landed at Cologne/Bonn Airport late Thursday that “all arrived safe and sound” and they will undergo health checks in the coming days.

“Many did not expect this to happen now and are still full of the feelings that are connected with suddenly being free,” he said, adding that “many feared for their health and their lives.”

The 16 prisoners freed by Russia and Belarus included five German citizens, and the deal involved Germany deporting to Russia Vadim Krasikov, who was serving a life prison sentence for what judges concluded was a Russian state-ordered killing in Berlin in 2019.

Scholz said: “I think this is the right decision. And if you had any doubts, then you lose them after speaking with those who are now free.”

The German leader said it was “a special moment for me, a moment that certainly has also very much intensified the friendship between the US and Germany.”

Updated

How Evan Gershkovich was finally freed after a 500-day odyssey in Russia’s prison system

Evan Gershkovich was on a reporting trip deep in the Russian regions when the FSB came for him. The Wall Street Journal reporter was in Yekaterinburg, more than 850 miles from the Russian capital, when agents approached his table at a local bistro. As they frog-marched him out of the restaurant, the officers pulled Gershkovich’s shirt over his head to obscure his identity, witnesses said. The signal was clear: this was no ordinary arrest.

That began a nearly 500-day odyssey in Russia’s notorious prison system for Gershkovich, the first reporter to be arrested and charged with espionage since the cold war. The Russian government said Gershkovich had been recruited by the CIA to collect information about the country’s larger producer of main battle tanks, Uralvagonzavod.

The ensuing year of negotiations pulled in hundreds of other people, including Russian political prisoners and Russian spies held abroad, friends and family to provide support, negotiators on both sides, a Russian billionaire reportedly acting as broker in the exchange, as well as the jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died amid rumours that the west had presented Putin with a grand deal to free Krasikov and Gershkovich in a three-way trade back in February.

We are expecting Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, the former US marine Paul Whelan and the journalist and joint US-Russian citizen Alsu Kurmasheva to arrive at the White House at around 11.30pm ET, where they will be met by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

The Guardian’s Pjotr Sauer is celebrating the release of his friend and colleague:

Putin barely hid his true aim throughout this ordeal: to free a man named Vadim Krasikov, who was until today serving a life sentence for the assassination of a Chechen rebel commander in Berlin’s Tiergarten.

In his interview with Tucker Carlson earlier this year, Putin described Krasikov as “a person who eliminated a bandit in one of the European capitals, due to patriotic sentiments”. But a little digging into his background suggested Krasikov was likely an elite FSB assassin tasked with murdering Putin’s opponents abroad. He was caught red-handed after the attack, having been spotted by passersby.

“Putin had become maniacal about getting Krasikov back; he really, really wanted Krasikov,” a source with knowledge of Kremlin deliberations on the issue told the Guardian earlier this year. “It was a symbol that we don’t abandon our people. He killed someone for us and we want people like that to know that they will be fought for to get them back.”

The New York Times has published an account of what the day was like inside the Wall Street Journal newsroom as their reporter, Evan Gershkovich, was freed. The journal continued to prominently feature reporting about Gershkovich’s imprisonment for over a year:

At 11.16am on Thursday, Emma Tucker, the top editor of The Wall Street Journal, broke the news of his release to the full Journal newsroom: “A few moments ago, Evan walked free from a Russian plane. He will shortly be on a flight back to the US”

Whoops of joy and cheers followed. Staff members quickly gathered in the center of The Journal’s New York newsroom with champagne, some in tears, to hear Ms. Tucker give a toast to Mr. Gershkovich’s freedom and the hard work it had taken to get there. Praise went to Paul Beckett, the former Washington bureau chief who worked on Mr. Gershkovich’s release full time for the past nine months.

Similar celebrations played out in The Journal’s London bureau. “He’s off the plane!” shouted Gráinne McCarthy, a top international editor in London, several Journal reporters recalled outside their office on Thursday.

“It feels like the end of a nightmare,” said Eliot Brown, who covers finance and is a close friend of Mr. Gershkovich’s.

Hello, this is Helen Sullivan bringing you the latest for the next while.

Summary of the day so far

The largest prisoner swap between Russia and the US since the cold war took place on Thursday with the release of 16 people from Russian and Belarusian jails, in exchange for eight Russians.

Here’s a recap of the main developments:

  • Among those freed from Russian custody include the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, the former US marine Paul Whelan and the journalist and joint US-Russian citizen Alsu Kurmasheva. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, who is the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, are expected to personally receive them when they arrive at Joint Base Andrews later tonight.

  • The exchange also included the release of the Russian-opposition politician, Ilya Yashin, and several other opposition figures including the British-Russian politician, Vladimir Kara-Murza, and three people who had worked for the opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in prison earlier this year.

  • Alexei Navalny was meant to be a part of the exchange deal before his death in February, the US national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, told reporters.

  • Among the prisoners returning to Russia was the assassin Vadim Krasikov, who had been held in a German prison since 2019 for murdering a Chechen exile in Berlin in broad daylight. The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, said freeing Krasikov had not been an easy decision, but in the end was deemed a sacrifice worth making.

  • Several deep-cover Russian “illegal” spies arrested in Norway and Slovenia were swapped, along with Russians held on criminal charges in US jails. Here is the full list of people who were involved in the prisoner exchange between Russia and the west.

  • The exchange on Thursday occurred at Ankara airport in Turkey, and involved people held in seven different countries including the US, Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Norway, Russia and Belarus. The Turkish presidency said 10 prisoners were relocated to Russia, 13 prisoners to Germany and three to the US.

  • The US president, Joe Biden, said the exchange deal was made possible by a “feat of diplomacy and friendship”. He thanked Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Norway and Turkey for their help in bringing the deal together. Speaking from the White House and surrounded by family members of the freed prisoners, Biden asked the room to sing happy birthday to 12-year-old Miriam, daughter of Alsu Kurmasheva, who he said is turning 13 on Friday.

  • The swap is likely to be considered a political coup for Biden in the waning months of his presidency, and a blow to Donald Trump, who has claimed on the 2024 campaign trail that he would free Gershkovich if re-elected.

  • The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, meeting the returning Russian prisoners, said the Kremlin had “not forgotten about you for a minute” and said that all of those involved in military service would receive state awards.

  • The editor of the Wall Street Journal, Emma Tucker, described the event as a “joyous day” for friends, family and colleagues of Gershkovich, and the “the millions of well-wishers in the US and around the world who stood with Evan and defended the free press”.

Updated

Brittney Griner says she is 'head over heels’ for released Americans

Brittney Griner, the US basketball star who was imprisoned in Russia for 10 months before her release in 2022 as part of a prisoner exchange, said she is “head over heels” that fellow Americans are coming home from Russia.

“Great day. It’s a great day. It’s a great day,” Griner said after the US women beat Belgium in the Paris Olympic Games quarter-finals, AP reported.

We’ll talk more about it later. But head-over-heels happy for the families right now. Any day that Americans come home, that’s a win. That’s a win.

Griner was released in December 2022 as part of a deal in which she was swapped for the Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout.

She was arrested in February 2022 at an airport in Russia after authorities said she was carrying vape canisters with cannabis oil. The US state department declared her to be wrongfully detained.

Updated

Germany’s chancellor Olaf Scholz admitted that it was a difficult decision to release the Russian prisoner Vadim Krasikov as part of the exchange.

Scholz was speaking to reporters at the Cologne/Bonn airport from where he was waiting to welcome freed German prisoners, Deutsche Welle reported. He said:

It was not easy for anyone to make this decision to deport a murderer sentenced to life imprisonment after only a few years in prison.

He said the decision was made by his coalition government “after careful consideration”, and that both he and the opposition leader, Friedrich Merz, agreed with it.

Updated

Here are some images from the newswires showing Russia’s president Vladimir Putin meeting the newly released Russian prisoners at Vnukovo airport outside Moscow.

Updated

The US national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, choked up with emotion as he described the collective effort behind the release of US citizens detained in Russia.

Sullivan, in a briefing with reporters, said he had spent a lot of time with the families of the Wall Street Journal reporter, Evan Gershkovich, and the ex-marine Paul Whelan.

“Most of the time, as you can imagine, those are tough conversations,” Sullivan said. “But not today,” he said as he began to tear up.

Today was very good day.

Here’s the clip:

Updated

Trump criticizes US negotiators in prisoner swap

Donald Trump has lit into today’s prisoner swap with Russia, via his social media platform Truth Social.

“So when are they going to release the details of the prisoner swap with Russia? How many people do we get versus them? Are we also paying them cash?” the former president and current Republican presidential nominee, posted.

He continued: “Our ‘negotiators’ are always an embarrassment to us! I got back many hostages, and gave the opposing Country NOTHING -- and never any cash.”

The Wall Street Journal, Gerskovich’s outlet, noted that Trump “once predicted Evan Gershkovich wouldn’t be freed under President Biden”. The WSJ also lists some prisoner swaps in the Trump administration. The US government has said it did not pay out any cash for today’s swap.

Updated

Family of freed WSJ journalist waiting to give 'biggest hug'

The family of Evan Gershkovich has issued a statement expressing their joy and relief that their loved one is free and on his way back to them, as well as the other two US citizens freed alongside him, Paul Whelan and Alsu Kurmasheva.

“We have waited 491 days for Evan’s release, and it’s hard to describe what today feels like. We can’t wait to give him the biggest hug and see his sweet and brave smile up close,” the statement said, according to CNN.

It continued: “Most important now is taking care of Evan and being together again. No family should have to go through this, and so we share relief and joy today with Paul and Alsu’s families.”

Updated

Kamala Harris spoke earlier today with Yulia Navalnaya, widow of Alexei Navalny, following the release of 16 individuals from Russia, the White House said.

Those released by Russia today, the White House summarized, included three US citizens, one US green card holder, as well as five German citizens and seven Russian citizens who were political prisoners, several of whom worked with Navalny in his efforts to combat corruption and to build a free, democratic Russia.

“The Vice President welcomed the release of these individuals and reaffirmed that she will continue to stand with those fighting for freedom in Russia and around the world,” a White House statement said.

It added that Harris commended Navalnaya for her courage in continuing her husband’s work for justice and the rule of the law in Russia.

“The vice president previously met with Navalnaya in February 2024 at the Munich Security Conference, just hours after the terrible news broke of Navalny’s death in a Russian prison,” the White House said, linking to this post on Twitter/X from the time.

Updated

Biden, Harris to meet freed Americans arriving from Russia

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are expected to meet the Americans freed from Russian custody when they arrive back in the US tonight.

The US president and his vice-president – now presumptive Democratic nominee for president in the 2024 election – will meet those returning to US soil at 11.30pm ET today.

The White House issued updated guidance a few moments ago to say that Biden and Harris will travel to Joint Base Andrews, the military facility in Maryland, where they will “greet Americans freed from Russia” and stay for about half an hour before returning to Washington DC.

Biden will travel from the White House. Harris moments ago boarded AF2 in Houston, Texas, where she has been attending the memorial for the late congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee.

Updated

The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, greeted the returning prisoners with a handshake and a clap on the back as they landed in Moscow, Reuters is reporting.

Putin told the released Russian prisoners that he “wanted to congratulate everyone on their return to the motherland”, the New York Times reported. Putin was joined by the Russian spy chief, Sergei Naryshkin, and Andrei Belousov, the minister of defence.

Today’s exchange deal included eight prisoners returning to Russia:

  • Vadim Krasikov: Putin had long indicated Krasikov as his No 1 demand in any swap. He was arrested in 2019 after shooting dead the Chechen exile Zelimkhan Khangoshvili in broad daylight in a Berlin park.

  • Artem Dultsev and Anna Dultseva: the pair were deep-cover Russian spies who pretended to be a married Argentinian couple. They lived in Ljubljana, Slovenia, with their two children, from where they are believed to have carried out tasks for Russian intelligence across Europe.

  • Mikhail Mikushin: Mikushin was arrested in the northern Norwegian city of Tromsø, where he worked as a researcher at a university, ironically engaged in assessing hybrid security threats.

  • Vladislav Klyushin: a Russian businessman with ties to the Kremlin, Klyushin was sentenced to nine years in a US prison for his role in a $90m insider trading scheme involving hacked secret earnings information about multiple companies.

  • Roman Seleznev: the son of a Russian Duma deputy, Seleznev was sentenced to 27 years in prison, the longest-ever hacking-related sentence in the US.

  • Vadim Konoshchenok: Konoshchenok was arrested over a scheme to export US-made technology intended for use by Russia in its invasion of Ukraine.

  • Pablo González/Pavel Rubtsov: a dual Spanish-Russian national, González was a journalist who had worked for many years for Spanish publications, frequently in Russia and Ukraine. He was arrested in Poland, near the border with Ukraine, in March 2022 and has been held in jail in Poland since, accused of being a Russian spy.

Updated

A plane carrying Russian citizens released in the prisoner swap has arrived in Moscow from Ankara, Russian state media is reporting.

CNN previously reported that all seven aircraft involved in the prisoner swap were airborne, according to flight tracking data.

Six of the flights are US-registered planes, it said, with the tracking data showing they were heading north-east from the Turkish capital and flying across Europe.

Updated

The Wall Street Journal’s Vaughn Sterling has shared a video clip of the newsroom reacting to the paper’s editor-in-chief, Emma Tucker, announcing Evan Gershkovich’s release.

Updated

Exiled Belarusian opposition leader says exchange is good sign for her country's political prisoners

The exiled leader of Belarus’s opposition, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, has said she hopes today’s exchange is a good sign for her own country’s political prisoners.

Belarus holds nearly 1,400 political prisoners, according to human rights observers. In a statement, Tsikhanouskaya said:

We welcome the freeing of political prisoners from Russian jails and the fact that such an exchange of captives is an important precedent that helps releases of Belarusians.

Updated

The US ambassador to Turkey, Jeff Flake, said a plane carrying the released Americans has taken off en route to the US.

Updated

The press freedom group Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has issued a statement welcoming the release of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty editor Alsu Kurmasheva as part of the prisoner exchange.

“Evan and Alsu have been apart from their families for far too long,” said CPJ head Jodie Ginsberg, adding that the pair had been detained and sentenced on “spurious charges” that had been “intended to punish them for their journalism and stifle independent reporting”.

Their 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.

Updated

European Council president welcomes release of prisoners

Charles Michel, the president of the European Council, has welcomed the release of the 16 people “unjustly jailed by the Russian regime”.

Posting to Twitter/X, Michel said:

Alsu, Evan, Paul, Vladimir and others, you belong home with your families and loved ones!

The EU “will continue supporting and standing for all those illegally detained in Russia and elsewhere”, he added.

Updated

Norway’s prime minister, Jonas Gahr Støre, has confirmed that today’s prisoner exchange includes Mikhail Mikushin, a suspected senior Russian military intelligence officer who was arrested in Norway in 2022.

“The exchange has been made possible through extensive international cooperation,” Støre said in a statement, the Associated Press reported.

For the Norwegian authorities, it has been important to contribute in such cooperation with our close allies. A close collaboration across several countries has made this possible.

Updated

The White House’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said no money was exchanged as part of today’s exchange.

Sullivan, who celebrated “one of the largest and certainly the most complex exchange in history”, added that no sanctions were loosened to facilitate the deal.

Joe Biden has shared a photo of the newly freed Americans on a plane leaving Russia. The US president wrote:

After enduring unimaginable suffering and uncertainty, the Americans detained in Russia are safe, free, and have begun their journeys back into the arms of their families.

Updated

The US national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, in his briefing with reporters, described Marc Fogel, an American sentenced to 14 years of hard labour in Russia, as “wrongfully detained”.

This is the first time a US official has categorized Fogel as “wrongfully detained”, CNN reports.

The US state department has not publicly designated Fogel as wrongfully detained but has called for his release.

The family of Marc Fogel, an American teacher detained in Russia, has issued a statement.

“It is inconceivable to us that Russian dissidents would be prioritized over US citizens in a prisoner exchange,” they said in a statement shared by the New York Times.

Marc has been unjustly detained for far too long and must be prioritized in any swap negotiations with Russia, regardless of his level of notoriety or celebrity.

Updated

Barack Obama has described today’s exchange as a “tremendous diplomatic achievement” and noted the “skill and persistence” of Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and US allies.

“We’re grateful that they’ll be back home with their families where they belong,” the former US president added in a post on X.

Updated

The UK foreign secretary, David Lammy, has issued a statement welcoming the news of the release.

I strongly welcome the news that Russia has released a number of prisoners today, and am particularly relieved that British nationals Vladimir Kara-Murza and Paul Whelan will soon be reunited with their families.

Mr Kara-Murza is a dedicated opponent of Putin’s regime. He should never have been in prison in the first place: the Russian authorities imprisoned him in life-threatening conditions because he courageously told the truth about the war in Ukraine. I pay tribute to his family’s courage in the face of such hardship and hope to speak to him soon.

Paul Whelan and his family have also experienced an unimaginable ordeal. I look forward to speaking to him as he returns home to his family in the United States after over 5 years in detention.

Video shows moment released prisoners board plane leaving Russia

Russian state TV shows the moment journalist Evan Gershkovich, Vladimir Kara-Murza, Paul Whelan and other members of the prisoner exchange board a plane to leave Russia.

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris will welcome the released American citizens at Joint Base Andrews, the White House’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan says.

Evan Gershkovich, Paul Whelan and Alsu Kurmasheva are expected to arrive on US soil tonight, he says.

Vladimir Kara-Murza will be travelling to Germany, and his family will be travelling there to meet him. He is expected to return to the US to meet the president later on, Sullivan says.

Updated

Jake Sullivan is asked if the exchange deal lays any groundwork for discussions about the war in Ukraine.

The US national security adviser says the US does not see any link between the detained persons negotiations and any potential diplomacy over the war in Ukraine. “We see those as operating on separate tracks,” he tells reporters.

One is about the practical issue of producing this exchange. The other is a much more complex question.

Updated

The White House’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, says US officials had no direct engagement with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, over the exchange.

US officials had “extensive” engagement with Russian officials, he said.

Asked about the US vice-president Kamala Harris’s involvement in today’s exchange, the White House says Harris spoke about the issue with the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, at the Munich security conference earlier this year.

The US national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, says he has say in the Oval Office “more times than I can count” over the past years to provide briefings and updates to both the US president, Joe Biden, and his vice-president.

Harris was “very much core” to the team that helped make the exchange happen, Sullivan says.

US national security adviser Jake Sullivan is asked how the US will try to make sure that today’s exchange doesn’t incentivize more detentions.

Sullivan acknowledges that it is a “difficult” choice whether to send back a convicted criminal in order to secure the release of an innocent American, but he adds:

Sometimes the choice is between doing that and consigning that person to live out their days in prison.

Jake Sullivan, the US national security adviser, is asked to provide some color as to what happened in the Oval Office between Joe Biden and the families of the released Americans.

Sullivan says “it was a kind of extraordinary personal exchange” and that the family members were “overwhelmed” by the events of the day.

“It was quite a moment,” Sullivan says.

Updated

Jake Sullivan, the White House’s national security adviser, acknowledges that there was an earlier effort to work on a deal that would have included the release of Alexei Navalny. “Unfortunately, he died,” Sullivan says.

Sullivan says that on the day that Navalny died, he told Evan Gershkovich’s parents that the US president was “determined” to get a deal done to secure the release of their son.

US national security adviser Jake Sullivan becomes emotional as he speaks to reporters. “Today was a very good day,” he says.

He says the US is going to be “drawing inspiration and continued courage” from all those who are being held hostage or wrongfully detained around the world.

Updated

Jake Sullivan, the US national security adviser, says Joe Biden is reaching out to give his personal thanks to the leaders of Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Norway and Turkey. Sullivan says:

This was vintage Joe Biden: rallying America, rallying American allies to save American citizens and Russian freedom fighters, and doing it with intricate statecraft, pulling his whole team together to drive this across the finish line.

The US president’s goal has always been to “put families first”, he says.

Updated

Prisoner swap 'a feat of diplomacy that could have only been achieved by Biden', says White House

Jake Sullivan, the US national security adviser, says the Biden administration is proud to celebrate the return of more than 70 Americans from around the world.

Sullivan says today’s exchange is a “feat of diplomacy” that could have “only been achieved by a leader like Joe Biden”.

Under Biden’s direction, the national security, foreign policy and intelligence community worked “tirelessly and relentlessly” to secure the release of 16 individuals who were detained in Russia, Sullivan says.

Those freed from Russian detention were three American citizens, one American green card holder, five German citizens and seven Russian political prisoners, in exchange for eight individuals held by the US, Germany, Norway, Slovenia and Poland.

Sullivan says Biden was “personally engaged” in the diplomacy that brought the exchange about, including “multiple conversations” with the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, as well as other leaders.

Updated

Jake Sullivan, the White House’s national security adviser, tells reporters that the US has completed “one of the largest and certainly the most complex exchange in history”.

Sullivan says he was with the US president, Joe Biden, in the Oval Office today as the families of Evan Gershkovich, Paul Whelan and Vladimir Kara-Murza were told of their release.

The US president and the relatives of the prisoners were able to speak by phone, Sullivan says.

To say that everyone in the room was overjoyed, even at a loss for words, was an understatement.

Updated

The White House is holding a briefing with reporters following the release of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and former US marine Paul Whelan, among others.

Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House’s press secretary, says it is a “historic and important” day.

She notes that “this is personal” for a lot of the reporters in the briefing room, especially for the Wall Street Journal team.

She notes that there are those who are still wrongfully detained or held hostage around the world, and says the US “reaffirm[s] our pledge to their familes”:

We see you. We are with you, and we will never stop working to bring your loved ones home – where they belong.

Updated

Summary of the day thus far

  • A major prisoner exchange that took place at Ankara airport on Thursday afternoon involved the freeing of several foreign citizens held in Russia and numerous Russian political prisoners.

  • Those freed included the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, former US marine Paul Whelan, US-Russian journalist Alsu Kurmasheva and Russian opposition figures such as Ilya Yashin and Vladimir Kara-Murza.

  • In exchange, eight Russians held in the west returned to Russia. Among them was the Russian assassin Vadim Krasikov, who has been held in a German prison, as well as deep-cover Russian “illegal” spies arrested in Norway and Slovenia.

  • The US president, Joe Biden, called the deal a “feat of diplomacy” and vowed that he “will not stop working until every American wrongfully detained or held hostage around the world is reunited with their family”.

  • Biden addressed the nation about the deal, with the released prisoners’ family members standing besides him, and stressed the importance of alliances.

  • The Kremlin said the decision to pardon and release prisoners was made in order to get Russian captives home.

  • A German government spokesperson said it “did not take this decision lightly” and that “the state’s interest in carrying out the prison sentence of a convicted criminal was weighed against the freedom, physical well-being and – in some cases – ultimately the lives of innocent people imprisoned in Russia and those unjustly politically imprisoned.”

Updated

The Kremlin has said that 12 prisoners released in the swap, including Americans, were pardoned by Vladimir Putin decrees, Reuters reported.

It also said the decision to pardon and release prisoners was made in order to get Russian captives home, and that it is grateful to countries who offered support for the swap.

A lawyer representing Pablo González – one of the prisoners exchanged today who had been held in jail in Poland and accused of being a Russian spy – said that the move “is a significant landmark in favour of the freedom of all those journalists who are currently being held prisoner in different countries”.

“It is worth underlining that the Russian authorities have shown a real interest in seeking a solution to this situation,” the lawyer said.

Updated

Yulia Navalnaya says release is 'huge victory' but urges to continue fight to free others

Yulia Navalnaya, the widow of Alexei Navalny, has said that “every released political prisoner is a huge victory and a reason to celebrate”.

But, she stressed: “We still have to fight for: Daniel Kholodny, Vadim Kobzev, Alexei Liptser, Igor Sergunin. We will do everything we can to secure their release. Freedom for all political prisoners!”

Updated

First picture of Evan Gershkovich, Alsu Kurmasheva and Paul Whelan

And here’s a first photo of the some of the released prisoners.

Updated

Who’s who among the prisoner exchange between Russia and the west?

Today’s deal includes political prisoners and journalists held in Russia and Belarus being swapped for Russians held in west.

The list includes figures such as Oleg Orlov, a veteran of the Soviet-era dissident movement, Sasha Skochilenko, a 33-year-old anti-war artist, and Ksenia Fadeyeva, an associate of the late Alexei Navalny.

Read about the prisoners who have been freed.

During his address, Joe Biden – who stood surrounded by the family members of freed prisoners – paused to lead a singing of happy birthday to 13-year old Miriam, daughter of journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, who was released as part of the exchange.

Updated

'Their brutal ordeal is over': Biden says deal was ' feat of diplomacy and friendship'

Joe Biden is speaking now about the prisoner exchange.

“Now, their brutal ordeal is over,” he said.

“Moments ago, the families and I were able to speak to them on the telephone from the Oval Office. They’re out of Russia,” Biden said, noting it’s an “incredible relief” for the families.

“The deal that made this possible was a feat of diplomacy and friendship,” he said.

For anyone who questions whether allies matter, Biden said, “today is a powerful example of why it’s vital to have friends in this world.”

“Our alliances make our people safer,” he said.

Updated

Kamala Harris, the US vice president and contender for the presidency, has said that “today, we celebrate the release of Paul, Evan, Alsu, Vladimir, and others who were unjustly held in Russia”.

“It gives me great comfort to know that their horrible ordeal is over and that they will soon be reunited with their families,” Harris said, adding that she and Joe Biden “will not stop working until every American who is wrongfully detained or held hostage is brought home.”

Updated

The Dow Jones CEO and Wall Street Journal publisher, Almar Latour, and the Wall Street Journal editor in chief, Emma Tucker, said that “we are overwhelmed with relief and elated for Evan and his family, as well as for the others who were released”.

“At the same time, we condemn in the strongest terms Vladimir Putin’s regime in Russia, which orchestrated Evan’s 491-day wrongful imprisonment based on sham accusations and a fake trial as part of an all-out assault on the free press and truth,” they said.

They added:

Evan and his family have displayed unrivaled courage, resilience and poise during this ordeal, which came to an end because of broad advocacy for his release around the world.

Specifically, we would like to thank the US government and numerous governments around the world, with particular gratitude to Germany; global news media organizations standing in solidarity with Evan; Evan’s vast international network of friends; and our colleagues at The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones and News Corp who supported Evan from the first hour of his captivity.

Updated

'The German government did not take this decision lightly', spokesperson says

The German government has confirmed its involvement in the exchange, saying it had been a difficult decision to release a convicted murderer in order to win others’ freedom.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s spokesman, Steffen Hebestreit, said in an emailed statement that the deal had been arranged “in close and trusting cooperation with the United States and European partners” making it possible “to secure the release of 15 people who were unlawfully detained in Russia and a German national who had been sentenced to death in Belarus,” Rico Krieger.

Hebestreit said their liberation was “only possible by deporting Russian nationals with a background in intelligence who were in prison in Europe and transferring them to Russia”.

He confirmed that among them was Vadim Krasikov, “who was sentenced to life imprisonment in Germany after murdering a Georgian citizen in Berlin”.

“The German government did not take this decision lightly,” Hebestreit said.

He added:

The state’s interest in carrying out the prison sentence of a convicted criminal was weighed against the freedom, physical well-being and - in some cases - ultimately the lives of innocent people imprisoned in Russia and those unjustly politically imprisoned. Our duty to protect German nationals as well as solidarity with the USA were important motivations.

Germany hopes “that all those freed today will recover from their physical and psychological suffering, in the company of their family and friends”, he said.

“Our thoughts go out to all those who are still imprisoned in Russia today for expressing their opinions and telling the truth about Putin’s war of aggression against Ukraine,” Hebestreit said. “Their courage should be an example to all democrats!”

The German government called on Russia and Belarus to release “all other political prisoners who are being unjustly held”.

Updated

Politicians across western capitals are reacting with joy and relief to the prisoner exchange.

Updated

The mood in the Wall Street Journal newsroom: “Best day ever.”

Updated

Blinken 'grateful' to allies who made exchange possible

The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has said that “Paul Whelan, Evan Gershkovich, and Alsu Kurmasheva are on their way to the United States to reunite with their families.”

“I’m grateful for all of those who worked to secure their freedom and for our allies and partners who made this deal possible,” he added.

A spokesperson for the German government said that the decision to release the Russian assassin Vadim Krasikov was not taken lightly, noting that the obligation to protect German citizens and express solidarity with the US were important factors.

Who is Vladimir Kara-Murza?

Another dissident freed from Russian custody as part of the exchange is Russian-British citizen Vladimir Kara-Murza.

The 42-year old was detained in Moscow on 11 April 2022 and later sentenced to 25 years on treason and other trumped-up charges.

An intellectual who started as a journalist before turning to politics, Kara-Murza has compared his case to a Stalinist show trial. He previously survived what he described as two government attempts to poison him.

Here are more fascinating details from the Wall Street Journal about the efforts that went into the prisoner exchange.

President Biden—about an hour before he notified the world he was dropping out of the presidential race on July 21—called the prime minister of Slovenia, whose country was contributing two convicted Russian spies to the swap, to secure the pardon necessary for the deal to proceed.

CIA Director William Burns traveled to Turkey last week to meet his counterpart there and finalize the logistics for the swap.

The German government has confirmed the release of 15 people “unjustly imprisoned in Russia,” Reuters reported.

Who is Alsu Kurmasheva?

Kurmasheva, one of the prisoner freed as part of the exchange, is a Russian-American journalist for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

A Russian court sentenced the 47-year old in July to six-and-a-half years in prison after a rushed, secret trial.

Kurmasheva, who has two children, was arrested last year during a family visit to the city of Kazan for failing to register as a “foreign agent” and for spreading “false information” about the country’s armed forces.

Stephen Capus, the RFE/RL president and CEO, had denounced her trial and conviction as “a mockery of justice”.

'Feat of diplomacy': Biden celebrates exchange, vows to keep working to release wrongfully detained

Joe Biden has released a statement about the prisoner exchange.

He called the deal a “feat of diplomacy” and vowing that he “will not stop working until every American wrongfully detained or held hostage around the world is reunited with their family.”

Today, three American citizens and one American green-card holder who were unjustly imprisoned in Russia are finally coming home: Paul Whelan, Evan Gershkovich, Alsu Kurmasheva, and Vladimir Kara-Murza.

The deal that secured their freedom was a feat of diplomacy. All told, we’ve negotiated the release of 16 people from Russia—including five Germans and seven Russian citizens who were political prisoners in their own country. Some of these women and men have been unjustly held for years. All have endured unimaginable suffering and uncertainty. Today, their agony is over.

I am grateful to our Allies who stood with us throughout tough, complex negotiations to achieve this outcome— including Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Norway, and Turkey. This is a powerful example of why it’s vital to have friends in this world whom you can trust and depend upon. Our alliances make Americans safer.

And let me be clear: I will not stop working until every American wrongfully detained or held hostage around the world is reunited with their family. My Administration has now brought home over 70 such Americans, many of whom were in captivity since before I took office. Still, too many families are suffering and separated from their loved ones, and I have no higher priority as President than bringing those Americans home.

Today, we celebrate the return of Paul, Evan, Alsu, and Vladimir and rejoice with their families. We remember all those still wrongfully detained or held hostage around the world. And reaffirm our pledge to their families: We see you. We are with you. And we will never stop working to bring your loved ones home where they belong.

Updated

Wall Street Journal confirms Evan Gershkovich is free

The Wall Street Journal has confirmed that its reporter Evan Gershkovich is now free.

The paper has this insight into his last move as a prisoner in Russia.

The Russian Federation had a few final items of protocol to tick through with the man who had become its most famous prisoner. One, he would be allowed to leave with the papers he’d penned in detention, the letters he’d scrawled out and the makings of a book he’d labored over. But first, they had another piece of writing they required from him, an official request for presidential clemency. The text, moreover, should be addressed to Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin.

The pro forma printout included a long blank space the prison could fill out if desired, or simply, as expected, leave blank. In the formal high Russian he had honed over 16 months imprisonment, the Journal’s Russia correspondent filled the page. The last line submitted a proposal of his own: After his release, would Putin be willing to sit down for an interview?

Updated

Michael McFaul, a former US ambassador to Russia, has thanked “all those who worked to free these fighters for freedom, human rights, and democracy.”

The president of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Stephen Capus, has said that the broadcaster welcomed news of RFE/RL journalist Alsu Kurmasheva’s “imminent release and are grateful to the American government and all who worked tirelessly to end her unjust treatment by Russia.”

Alsu’s release makes us even more determined to secure the freedom of three other RFE/RL journalists, cruelly imprisoned in Belarus and Russian-occupied Crimea.

We will not rest until all of our unjustly detained journalists are home safe. Journalism is not a crime.

The Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, has said let all enemies who left Russia stay away, and non-enemies can come home, Reuters reported.

Russia frees Evan Gershkovich and others in biggest prisoner swap since cold war

The Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich has been freed from Russian custody as part of a major exchange that also involved the freeing of several other foreign citizens held in Russia and numerous Russian political prisoners.

In the exchange, which took place at Ankara airport on Thursday afternoon, eight Russians held in the west returned to Russia. Among them was the Russian assassin Vadim Krasikov, who has been held in a German prison since 2019 for the murder of a Chechen exile in Berlin.

Additionally, deep-cover Russian “illegal” spies arrested in Norway and Slovenia were swapped, along with Russians held on criminal charges in US jails. Two minors were also returned to Russia, believed to be the children of the spies jailed in Slovenia.

Read the full story here.

Turkey names five prisoners involved in swap

Turkey’s National Intelligence Organisation, known as MIT, said that it “conducted the most extensive prisoner exchange operation of recent times,” on the tarmac in Ankara, exchanging 26 different people held in seven different countries: the United States, Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Norway, Russia, and Belarus.

“The prisoner exchange encompassed the exchange of significant figures that have been sought by all parties for a long period,” they said, naming just five, including Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and former US marine Paul Whelan who were both jailed in Russia.

Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin and German Rico Krieger were also named in the statement. Vadim Krasikov, a hitman jailed in Germany who MIT described as a colonel with Russia’s Federal Security Service, or FSB, was also named as part of the prisoner swap.

Seven different aircraft carried the 26 different individuals to Turkey, they said.

Two flew from the United States, one each from Russia, Germany, Poland, Slovenia and Norway to perform the intricate operation in the Turkish capital. Mediation for the swap began under the auspices of MIT in Turkey last month, they added.

The large number of prisoners involved in the swap came with added complications.

Prisoners were taken off each aircraft and then moved to secure locations by MIT, to undergo health checks and ensure that each part of the swap deal was ratified, before being placed back onto the planes heading to their respective destinations.

“Ten prisoners, including two minors, were relocated to Russia, thirteen prisoners to Germany, and three prisoners to the United States,” they said. “This operation has been recorded in history as the most extensive prisoner exchange between the United States, Russia, and Germany in recent years.”

From what we can see, the exchange is still in process, and hasn’t officially ended until all of the planes have left the tarmac in Ankara.

Updated

As part of the exchange, Germany has released a Russian assassin, Vadim Krasikov, according to a Turkish presidency statement.

A high-ranking colonel in the Russian secret service FSB, the 58-year old was serving a life sentence in a German jail for the 2019 murder of Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, a Georgian-born Chechen dissident, in Berlin’s central Tiergarten park.

Vladimir Putin had made it clear that securing Krasikov’s return to Russia was his No 1 target.

The Russian leader alluded to him in February, saying the release of the US journalist Evan Gershkovich could be secured in a prison swap involving a man, whom he described as a “patriot” serving a life sentence in a “US allied country” after being convicted of “liquidating a bandit”.

As part of the deal, according to the Turkish presidency, Belarus has released German citizen Rico Krieger.

Krieger was sentenced to death but granted a pardon this week by the country’s autocratic leader, Alexander Lukashenko.

Krieger formerly worked for the German Red Cross, and was accused of placing explosives on a rail track in the country on the orders of Ukrainian intelligence.

One of the figures freed as part of the prisoner exchange, according to the Turkish presidency, was Ilya Yashin, one of Russia’s most prominent opposition leaders.

Yashin has been serving an 8.5-year sentence for criticising Russia’s war in Ukraine.

He had said in letters from prison that he believed Vladimir Putin had gone “mad from power.”

“I understand my own risks. I am behind bars, my life is in Putin’s hands, and it is in danger. But I will continue to push my line,” he wrote.

Updated

Here’s a live feed of the airport in Ankara.

The Turkish presidency has said that ten prisoners have been relocated to Russia, 13 prisoners to Germany and three to the United States, Reuters reported.

The prisoners in the swap are from the US, Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Norway, Russia and Belarus, Turkey said.

Here’s a photo from Ankara today, as a major prisoner swap is reportedly under way.

Updated

Who is Paul Whelan?

Whelan, 54, is a retired US marine who was arrested back in 2018.

Russian authorities arrested Whelan – a corporate security executive from Michigan – at a hotel in Moscow on accusations that he was part of an intelligence-gathering operation.

He received a 16-year prison sentence in 2020. He insists that the evidence against him was falsified.

Last year, Whelan – who also holds UK, Irish and Canadian passports – said that being omitted from two previous prisoner swaps with the Kremlin at best “painted a target” on his back.

Turkish channel NTV is running footage from an airport in Ankara, reportedly showing part of the prisoner exchange process.

Updated

Who is Evan Gershkovich?

Gershkovich is an American Wall Street Journal reporter who was arrested while reporting in the Urals city of Yekaterinburg in March 2023.

In July, a Russian court found the 32-year old guilty of espionage and sentenced him to 16 years in prison.

The Wall Street Journal described the verdict as a “disgraceful, sham conviction”.

The US ambassador to Russia, Lynne Tracy, had said Gershkovich’s case “is not about evidence, due process, or rule of law. It is about using American citizens as pawns to achieve political ends”.

Turkish intelligence agency says it's coordinating swap

The Turkish National Intelligence Agency (MIT) said it would coordinate an extensive prisoner swap today, Reuters reported.

“A (prisoner) exchange operation will take place today under the coordination of our organisation,” the agency said in a statement.

It added:

Our organization has undertaken a major mediation role in this exchange operation, which is the most comprehensive of the recent period.

Russia prisoner swap involving US journalist Evan Gershkovich under way

A major prisoner exchange between Russia and the west is under way involving the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, who has been freed from Russian custody, Bloomberg has reported, citing people familiar with the situation.

Sources with knowledge of the planned exchange confirmed to the Guardian that a major swap would take place on Thursday in a location outside Russia. They declined to make further details public until after the swap had taken place owing to sensitivity of the matter.

Gershkovich and the former US marine Paul Whelan, both accused by Russian authorities of espionage, had already been freed and were en route to a destination outside Russia, Bloomberg reported.

The Guardian understands the exchange will also involve Russian political prisoners being freed as well as numerous Russians jailed in the west for espionage, murder and other crimes being returned to Russia.

Read the full story here.

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