In the United States, there is hope that top athlete Brittney Griner, who has been imprisoned in Russia, will be freed in a barter. But the Kremlin insists on maximum demands.
American athlete Brittney Griner during her trial near Moscow in late July. Griner has been in prison for an alleged drug offense since February.
In the end, the American Brittney Griner is said to have even softened the hearts of her Russian prison guards and the cellmates in the prison in the small town of Rickshaw near Moscow. When the basketball player and two-time Olympic champion left for the verdict in her criminal trial on Thursday, she received many congratulations, according to her lawyer Alexander Boikow.
In reality, however, Griner already had almost no chance at that point. This was not due to the allegation of smuggling hash oil – a crime to which she has pleaded guilty. Rather, the fate of the professional athlete, who had played repeatedly for the Russian club UGMK in recent years, was hardly at the sole discretion of the court at that time. The American was apparently seen from the start in the Kremlin as a trump card to force Washington into talks and exchanges for Russians convicted in the US.
Unusually draconian judgment
For example, Griner received a nine-year prison sentence for less than a gram of hash oil she had on a flight from the US to Moscow in early February. She had a doctor’s prescription for it in her home country, but the substance is banned in Russia. The horrendous sentence underscores that Griner was more than a casual victim of Russia’s rigid drug laws. Arseni Lewinson, a human rights and drug law expert, called the verdict exceptionally harsh.
Although the paragraph put forward by the prosecution provides for a maximum sentence of ten years, there has not been a single sentence with more than eight years imprisonment since 2018. Nearly half of the defendants were sentenced to probation, Lewinson said, with most of the rest getting away with less than five years. “Griner is a hostage in a geopolitical game with the United States,” says the expert.
In fact, a semi-public dialogue between Moscow and Washington has been going on for weeks that could amount to a prisoner swap. Foreign Ministers Antony Blinken and Sergei Lavrov met at the end of July for the first telephone call since the start of the Ukraine war. However, several stumbling blocks remain.
For one thing, Russia wants to inflate the price of Griner’s release. The first offer from the US involved an exchange of two American citizens for one Russian. In addition to Griner, Russia should also release Paul Whelan, who has been in prison in Russia for four years on espionage charges. In return, Moscow should get Viktor Bout. In 2011, But was sentenced to 25 years in prison by a US court for arms smuggling and supporting terrorism.
In recent years, the Russians have become quiet. Nonetheless, Bout is seen in Russia as a man with far-reaching connections to militant groups around the world. As an arms dealer, he supplied Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Colombian guerrilla FARC, for example. There is also evidence of numerous deals with African governments and rebels in countries such as Liberia, Sudan and Congo-Kinshasa. But rejects the allegations.
The Russian Viktor But, convicted of illegal arms trafficking, when he was arrested in Thailand in 2010.
From the Russian point of view, however, the American offer is not enough. Instead, Moscow wants to force a “two for two” swap. After all, Bout is by no means the only high-profile criminal with a Russian passport who is in an American prison. Last December, for example, cybercriminal Vladislav Klyushin was extradited to the United States after his arrest in Switzerland.
Russia wants a different procedure
On the other hand, the Kremlin is pursuing a second goal. Foreign Minister Lavrov said on Friday that Russia was ready for further talks. However, a special communication channel should be used for this, which Presidents Vladimir Putin and Joe Biden agreed on last year at their summit in Switzerland. The then agreed diplomatic talks on the exchange of persons from Russia and the USA had produced no results. At the same time, both Lavrov and Putin’s spokesman have criticized the US for public statements on the Griner case. They insisted on secrecy on this issue.
It would be in Moscow’s interest if the issue of prisoner exchanges were resolved in a way that provided for regular contacts between Russia and the United States. In this way, the Kremlin could prove that complete isolation of the country against the background of the Ukraine war is not possible and that discreet talks are needed between the two countries. Basketball player Brittney Griner’s future now depends on the White House getting involved in this game.