- Largest prisoner swap since Cold War
- Kara-Murza, Gershkovich among released
- Kara-Murza’s emotional reunion with family
Dual UK–Russian citizen Vladimir Kara-Murza and American journalist Evan Gershkovich were among those released on Thursday in the largest East-West prisoner exchange since the Cold War.
A British citizen who was released in the largest prisoner swap with Russia since the Cold War has said that he believed he was being led to his death.
Speaking in Bonn, Germany, Vladimir Kara-Murza stated that on the day he was abducted from his jail cell in Siberia and transferred to the Russian capital, he had no knowledge he was part of the prisoner swap.
“The night I was taken from my cell in Siberia, as I now know to be taken in preparation for this, I was almost certain I was being led out to be executed,” according to him.
The British-Russian national was serving a 25-year term for treason after being imprisoned in Russia for more than two years.
Mr Kara-Murza stated that he only spoke with his wife once and his three children twice in two years and four months.
He is scheduled to be reunited with his family tomorrow morning.
He said, “I don’t think I’ll be able to find the right words to express how I feel about seeing them tomorrow morning.”
I can’t tell you how excited I am for that moment… plans and thoughts about the future haven’t been at the forefront of my mind.
On Thursday, about two dozen people from Russia, the United States, Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Norway, and Belarus were exchanged, a decision that drew criticism from German citizens after the government agreed to release Vadim Krasikov, a Russian convicted of the 2019 murder of a former Chechen militant in Berlin.
Addressing critics of the swap, Mr Kara-Murza stated that the only thing that mattered was that the arrangement saved 16 human lives.
Easy decisions only happen in dictatorships because everything is decided by the click of one person’s finger, he remarked. Decisions in a democracy are always difficult.
According to Mr Kara-Murza, the distinction between dictatorships and democracies is that in democratic institutions, human life is valued above everything else.
I’ll return to Russia.
Despite leaving Russia, Mr Kara-Murza stated that he is confident that he will return one day, despite the hazards that returning may pose.
The word ‘ safe’ is not in our language as Russian opposition lawmakers, he said, adding, “But I love my country and believe in what I do, no matter how much these words have been tainted by Kremlin propaganda.”
He was also critical of Vladimir Putin’s current authority over the country, which he claimed does not represent most of the populace.
Russia deserves more than to be led by a corrupt, totalitarian regime. He stated that Russia deserves to be a normal, democratically run country.
I have no doubt that day will arrive, and as a politician, I will do all I can to bring it closer.
During a news conference earlier on Friday, Mr Kara-Murza highlighted the Ukraine conflict, which the Kremlin refers to as a special military operation.
The Kremlin propaganda seeks to make it appear that everyone in Russia supports the conflict in Ukraine, which is a falsehood, he claimed.
Please do not believe that this Kremlin deception has anything to do with real life.
Mr Kara-Murza spoke alongside Ilya Yashin and Andrei Pivovarov, who were also released as part of the US-Russia prisoner swap arrangement and are both critical of the Russian president’s administration.
Mr Pivovarov urged Western politicians to “turn to the people, not the power,” adding, “We must do everything to make our country free and democratic.”
While Mr Yashin stated that his goal is to return to Russia and work for a “free” country.
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The prisoner trade also featured Evan Gershkovich, a Wall Street Journal reporter, and Paul Whelan, a US marine.
However, the deal excluded several political detainees.
After landing in the United States, Mr Gershkovich’s first words concerned those still imprisoned in Russia who were unknown to the public.
Urging their release, he told The Guardian: “I just spent a month in prison in Yekaterinburg, and almost everyone I sat with is a political prisoner, and no one knows them publicly.
It would be beneficial to investigate whether we can act against them.
Mr Kara-Murza also believed that Putin critic Alexei Navalny, who died in a Russian jail camp in February, could still be alive if the West had agreed to the swap with the Kremlin earlier.
Among those repatriated to Russia as part of the trade were a “sleeper cell” pair, prolific cybercriminals, and an assassin.
