Chancellor Olaf Scholz welcomes freed prisoners in Germany
Chancellor Olaf Scholz has welcomed Germans and Russians freed in the prisoner swap to Germany and says he had “very moving” conversations with them.
Scholz said after they landed at Cologne/Bonn Airport late today that “all arrived safe and sound” and will undergo health checks in the coming days.
He said that “many did not expect this to happen now and are still full of the feelings that are connected with suddenly being free.” He added that “many feared for their health and their lives; that must be said very clearly.”
The 16 prisoners freed by Russia and Belarus included five German citizens, and the deal involved Germany's deporting Vadim Krasikov to Russia. Krasikov 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.”
He said it was “a special moment for me, a moment that certainly has also very much intensified the friendship between the U.S and Germany.”
The role Harris played in making the exchange deal happen
In February, Harris met with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, asked most of the aides to leave them and asked for Scholz’ help with a planned prisoner exchange with Russia, a White House official said.
Harris raised something Biden had recently discussed with Scholz — that Germany’s release of Vadim Krasikov was a critical component of getting a prisoner swap, the official said.
Krasikov, who was released as part of the exchange, is a Russian hitman who was jailed for life in Germany for the murder of a former Chechen militant in Berlin.
The meeting between Harris and Scholz occurred on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference.
“She moved the ball forward significantly in that meeting,” the White House official said.
At Munich, Harris also met with Slovenian Prime Minister Robert Golob in a meeting arranged specifically to try to help bring Slovenia on board with the multicountry prisoner swap, the White House official said.
Freed Americans expected to be offered post-isolation support
After their arrival at Joint Base Andrews tonight, Whelan, Gershkovich and Kurmasheva and their families will be offered a flight to Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio to receive post-isolation support at Brooke Army Medical Center, a defense official told NBC News.
They are due to arrive at 11:30 p.m. ET and are expected to be welcomed home by Biden and Harris.
Russian President Vladimir Putin was on the tarmac at Vnukovo Inernational Airport to offer hugs and handshakes to returnees who were released in the prisoner exchange deal with the U.S.
Griner: Any day Americans come home, that’s a win
VILLENEUVE-D’ASCQ, France — Brittney Griner knows only too well the swirling emotions of being involved in a prisoner swap, and she said tonight that she is “head over heels” that fellow Americans are going home from Russia.
“Great day. It’s a great day. It’s a great day,” Griner said after the U.S. women’s basketball team beat Belgium 87-74 to clinch a berth in the Paris Games quarterfinals. “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, a two-time Olympic gold medalist, went through her own high-profile prisoner exchange with Russia in 2022 after having been sentenced to nine years in jail for drug possession and smuggling that year.
Following the release of prisoners held in Russia, Harris told reporters, “It gives me great comfort to know that their horrible ordeal is over.”
She added that she is committed to bringing back Americans who have been wrongfully detained or held hostage.
‘He’s definitely not going to stop,’ associate says of dissident Vladimir Kara-Murza
The head of a global campaign that has led to sanctions against Russian officials who knows dissident Vladimir Kara-Murza says the outspoken Putin critic is not going to stay silent now that he is free.
"He’s definitely not going to stop," William Browder, who heads the Global Magnitsky Justice Campaign, said on MSNBC.
Kara-Murza helped get the 2012 Magnitsky Act passed. The law, which allows the U.S. to freeze the assets of human rights offenders, is named after Sergei Magnitsky, a whistleblowing attorney who died in a Russian prison.
"In fact, I just got a letter from him from prison last week where he told me that he’s learning Spanish," Browder said of Kara-Murza.
“And the reason he’s learning Spanish is he wants to go down to Latin America and get the Latin American countries to pass Magnitsky Acts so they can freeze the assets of the Putin regime and other Russian criminals,” he said.
Kara-Murza was arrested in April 2022 after he spoke out against Russia's invasion of Ukraine and was sentenced to a Siberian penal colony, and Browder said he would have died there but for this exchange. Kara-Murza also survived two poisoning attempts in 2015 and 2017, Browder said.
"He will go back full-steam," Browder said. "But the one thing he won't do — because I won't let him — is go back into Russia."
Video from Russia’s security service, the FSB, shows Gershkovich and Whelan boarding a plane along with Vladimir Kara-Murza, Patrick Schobel and Vadim Ostanin.
Russians released in prisoner swap land in Moscow
Russian President Vladimir Putin greeted the Russian prisoners released in the multinational prisoner swap today after they landed in Moscow.
“I would like to address those of you who are directly involved in military service. I would like to thank you for your loyalty to your oath, your duty and your Motherland, which has not forgotten you for even a minute,” Putin said on Russian state television. “And now, you are home.”
The first man greeted Putin greeted was Vadim Krasikov, who was jailed for life in Germany for the 2019 murder in Berlin of Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, a former Chechen separatist, in what prosecutors believed was a Russian state-sanctioned assassination.
“All of you will be presented with state awards. We will see each other again, talk about your future,” he said. “Now I just want to congratulate you on your return home.”
Biden and Harris to welcome freed Americans at 11:30 p.m.
President Biden and Vice President Harris are scheduled to greet Americans freed from wrongful detention in Russia tonight at around 11:30 p.m. at Joint Base Andrews, according to a schedule released by the White House.