IT criminals against regime critics: Russia swaps prisoners with the West
Russia and the West swap prisoners. Russia gets back IT criminals, spies and money launderers, as well as an FSB contract killer.
(Image: Patrick489, Public Domain (CC0))
Russia and the West exchange prisoners. It is the largest such exchange since the fall of the Berlin Wall 35 years ago. While all but one of those imprisoned in Russia were behind bars for opposition activities or espionage convictions, several of the exchanged Russians have been convicted of computer crimes. The "Tiergarten murderer" is also released. In return, five Germans and four Americans will be allowed to return home and seven previously imprisoned Russians will be allowed to leave their country. As The Insider writes, the interim death of imprisoned Russian dissident Alexei Navalny has delayed the prisoner exchange.
The US mainstream media outlet The Hill already reported on Wednesday about conspicuous transfers of prominent Western prisoners in Russia – several detainees such as Vladimir Kara-Murza and the American citizen Paul Whelan were transferred to an unknown location, their lawyers reported. The American journalist Evan Gershkovich has also been released. The three have already left the country via Turkey. Russia has exchanged a total of fifteen prisoners, Belarus one, namely the German Rico Krieger.
Botnet operator and carding professional back to Russia
In the other direction, at least eight Russians who had previously served time in Western prisons will be allowed to travel, several of them for digital offenses. Three of them in the USA: Vladislav K. was arrested in Switzerland and sentenced in the USA for using data spied on during intrusions into other people's computer systems for lucrative insider trading in securities.
Wadim K. is a Russian who was recently extradited from Estonia to the USA and has now been allowed to return home. The man is said to have attempted to procure US electronics and ammunition on behalf of the Kremlin, which is why the USA wanted to put him on trial for violating US export bans and money laundering. Roman S. belonged to a carding network that traded in stolen credit card data on a large scale. He has pleaded guilty.
The perpetrator of the so-called "Tiergarten murder" is also part of the group of people who were exchanged: Wadim K. allegedly belongs(ed) to the FSB secret service and shot dead a Chechen-Georgian rebel commander in Berlin's Tiergarten park in 2019, who had sought refuge in Berlin from repeated assassination attempts.
Special thanks to Olaf Scholz
Norway and Poland each release one Russian: Mikhail M. and Pavel R. are said to have lived in their respective countries under false identities and spied for Russia. They are joined by Anna and Artem D. A Slovenian court sentenced the two on Wednesday for spying for Russia for the time they had already spent in prison. The couple were thus released and must leave the country.
US President Joe Biden thanked Norway, Poland and Slovenia for supporting the negotiations, as well as Turkey for logistical support in carrying out the exchange. Biden expressed special thanks to Germany and Olaf Scholz. The Federal Chancellor managed to ensure that Rico Krieger, who was sentenced to death in Belarus, and four Germans imprisoned in Russia were allowed to return home: Kevin Lik, Hermann Moyzhes, Patrick Schöbel and Dieter (Demuri) Voronin.
Biden also assured that he would continue to work on freeing Marc Fogel. The American worked as a teacher in Moscow from 2012. In 2021, he was arrested there for importing 17 grams of marijuana, which was prescribed to him by a doctor due to chronic pain, and sentenced to 14 years in prison.
Vladimir Putin signed executive orders pardoning Paul Nicholas Whelan, Kevin Lik, Evan Gershkovich, Demuri Voronin, Vladimir Kara-Murza, Alsu Kurmasheva, Lilia Chanysheva, Vadim Ostanin, Ksenia Fadeyeva, Alexandra Skochilenko, Ilya Yashin, Andrei Pivovarov, and Oleg Orlov.
The decision to sign the executive orders was made with the aim of returning Russian citizens detained and imprisoned in foreign countries.
The Russian side would like to extend gratitude to President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko for his goodwill gesture of pardoning German citizen Rico Krieger who has been sentenced to death.
Moscow would also like to thank the leaders of all countries that provided assistance in preparing the exchange.
(CC BY 4.0 President of Russia)
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