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Brittney Griner has been detained in Russia since February.
A “significant” prisoner exchange offer.
That is what the Joe Biden administration claims to have done to get Russia to return basketball star Brittney Griner and former Marine Paul Whelan to the United States, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said Wednesday.
The Olympic gold medalist was detained in February at an airport near Moscow when authorities found e-cigarette cartridges laced with cannabis oil in her luggage.
Whelan, for his part, was arrested in Moscow in December 2018 and was sentenced in 2020 to 16 years in prison for being considered a spy.
Washington has said it believes both Griner and Whelan were wrongfully detained by Russia.
Press reports have indicated that Moscow reportedly interested in swapping basketball star for convicted Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout.
According to CNN, Washington hopes to obtain the release of both detainees in exchange for Bout.
Blinken said he would raise the issue in a call next week with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. The two officials have not spoken since the war in Ukraine began.
Both the White House and the State Department declined Wednesday to disclose details of the proposed deal.
A lawyer for Bout told Russian news outlet Ria Novosti that he could not comment on reports of a possible exchange with his client, but “this could change soon”.
The arms dealer, nicknamed “the merchant of death“He is currently serving a 25-year prison sentence. in the US on a charge of trying to sell weapons to a Colombian rebel group to kill Americans.
White House spokesman John Kirby confirmed that an offer had been made “several weeks ago,” but noted that Russia “has not engaged favorably so far.”
He also acknowledged that the negotiations to secure the release of Griner and Whelan are “a delicate job” and that the decision to go public with the proposal is risky.
“It won’t help us bring them home if we are negotiating in public”said.
Kirby added that a White House official had spoken with the Whelan and Griner families before Blinken’s announcement and that they would speak again in the next 48 hours.
image source, Getty Images
Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout was arrested at a hotel in Bangkok in 2008.
The agreement would be the first concrete action announced by the administration of President Joe Biden regarding the release of the 31-year-old basketball player.
An accident”
At his drug possession trial Wednesday, Griner said officials had made him sign documents, but “nobody explained any of it to me.”
He also said that he did not receive an explanation of his rights or access to a lawyer in the first hours of his detention and that he had to use a translation app on his phone to communicate.
The player, who has won two gold medals at the Olympics, pleaded guilty to the drug charges against her but denied knowingly breaking the law and said she had packed her bags in a hurry.
“I still don’t understand to this day how [los cartuchos de vape] ended up in my bags,” Griner said.
“With them accidentally in my bags, I take responsibility, but did not intend to smuggle or planning to smuggle anything into Russia,” he said.
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