Online trackers monitoring Russian prisoner movements have raised the alarm about a possible prisoner swap with Western countries, with the unknown whereabouts of several high-profile prisoners, including American prisoner Paul Whelan.
In addition to Whelan and British Russian prisoner Vladimir Kara-Murza, at least seven other prominent Russian dissidents have been unexpectedly transferred in recent days. Reuters reported.The exact whereabouts of Whelan and Kara Murza are unknown, their lawyers told the news agency.
Russian state media RIA also reported that a lawyer for Alexander Vinnik, a Russian man imprisoned in the United States, I will be joining the exchange soon.He declined to reveal his exact location.
RIA reported that information on four Russians imprisoned in the US – Vinnik, Maxim Marchenko, Vadim Konoshenko and Vladislav Klyushin – has disappeared from the Federal Penitentiary Service’s database.
Whelan has been in Russian custody since 2018 and is serving a 16-year sentence for espionage, a charge the U.S. government denies.
Whelan had complained he had been abandoned by the Biden administration after being left out of two previous prisoner swaps with Russia. Whelan is Russia’s longest-imprisoned American, and his charges are disputed by the U.S. government.
Kara Murza is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for The Washington Post who was sentenced to 25 years in prison for treason for criticizing the invasion of Ukraine.
His lawyer, Vadim Prokhorov, said: He wrote on Facebook Prokhorov said Wednesday that Kara Murza’s legal team has not been allowed to meet with him, adding that he is due to appear in court on Thursday. Prokhorov speculated that his client may have been put on a Moscow-bound military plane that was being tracked by online trackers early Wednesday.
Prokhorov said Kara Murza’s final resting place was a prison hospital near Omsk in Siberia.
At a UN meeting earlier this month, US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield urged the Russian foreign minister to release Whelan and Wall Street Journal journalist Evan Gershkovich.
“We will not rest until Paul and Evan come home and the barbaric practices of Russia continuing to use them as human pawns are put to a permanent end,” Thomas-Greenfield said. “That’s a promise.”
The last prisoner exchange between the United States and Russia was in 2022 to free WNBA star Brittney Griner.
