The release of US hostages Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan has been filmed as part of a historic prisoner swap between America and Russia.
The shaven-headed men were seen being escorted aboard a Russian plane bound for Turkey on Thursday where the exchange took place.
They were later joined by Russian-American journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, whose release was also negotiated as part of the deal.
In a government photograph shared online, the trio posed with an American flag, each looking thinner but happy to have escaped the hell-hole labor camps.
A total of 24 prisoners from seven different countries were freed as part of the deal – making it the largest and most complex East-West inmate exchange since the Cold War era.
US hostages including Paul Whelan (pictured) have been filmed being released from jail as part of a historic prisoner swap between America and Russia
Whelan’s release was negotiated with that of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich
The trio posed with a US flag with returning citizen Alsu Kurmasheva (center) who was also released on Thursday
A plane carrying American prisoners has landed in Turkey following a major swap between Russia and the US
The exchange took place in the Turkish capital of Ankara on Thursday morning.
Video shows the moment Gershkovich was loaded onto a bus bound for a Russian airport along with other prisoners.
He and Whelan were seen carrying their own bags aboard the Russian Tupolev Tu-204-300 aircraft whilst flanked by masked escorts.
‘Today is a joyous day for the safe return of our colleague Evan Gershkovich, who left a Russian aircraft moments ago in Turkey’s capital, Ankara, as part of a prisoner swap with Russia,’ WSJ Editor in Chief Emma Tucker said.
‘That it was done in a trade for Russian operatives guilty of serious crimes was predictable as the only solution given President Putin’s cynicism.
‘We are grateful to President Biden and his administration for working with persistence and determination to bring Evan home rather than see him shipped off to a Russian work camp for a crime he didn’t commit.’
She praised Gershkovich’s ‘strength, composure, humor’ and described him as an ‘inspiration’ during his near 500-day incarceration.
‘The bogus case against him represented many significant things,’ Tucker said. ‘A blow against press freedom. A warning to foreign journalists covering the Kremlin. A new tension in America’s relationship with Russia.’
Dow Jones CEO and Wall Street Journal Publisher Almar Latour also hailed the ‘unrivaled courage, resilience and poise’ of Gershkovich and his family during his ordeal.
President Biden shared this photo shortly after the release with the caption: ‘After enduring unimaginable suffering and uncertainty, the Americans detained in Russia are safe, free, and have begun their journeys back into the arms of their families’
Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich is among those released from prison in Russia
A Russian Tupolev Tu-204-300 aircraft prepares to land at Ankara Esenboga Airport in Ankara amid the exchange
‘We are overwhelmed with relief and elated for Evan and his family, as well as for the others who were released,’ he said.
‘At the same time, we condemn in the strongest terms Vladimir Putin’s regime in Russia, which orchestrated Evan’s 491-day wrongful imprisonment based on sham accusations and a fake trial as part of an all-out assault on the free press and truth.
‘Unfortunately, many journalists remain unjustly imprisoned in Russia and around the world.’
It is understood that White House officials, diplomats and the CIA were all part of the negotiation process – and painstakingly assessed which other Western and Middle Eastern countries were willing to release Russian prisoners as part of the deal.
According to the WSJ, last week CIA Director William Burns traveled to Turkey to finalize the logistics for the exchange with his Kremlin equivalent.
President Biden also played a role in the historic exchange – speaking directly with prime minister of Slovenia Robert Golob to get him on board with pardoning two Russian spies, who were to be handed back to Russia in the swap.
The exchange took place in the Turkish capital of Ankara on Thursday. The country has previously acted as a mediator for prisoner exchanges between Russia and the West
The president lauded the deal as a ‘feat of diplomacy’ as he confirmed 16 prisoners had been released from Russia, including seven opposition figures incarcerated in their homeland.
‘Some of these women and men have been unjustly held for years. All have endured unimaginable suffering and uncertainty. Today, their agony is over,’ Biden said.
‘This is a powerful example of why it’s vital to have friends in this world whom you can trust and depend upon. Our alliances make Americans safer.
‘And let me be clear: I will not stop working until every American wrongfully detained or held hostage around the world is reunited with their family.
‘Today, we celebrate the return of Paul, Evan, Alsu, and Vladimir and rejoice with their families.’
Gershkovich, 32, was detained in March 2023 on espionage charges that the United States says are illegitimate. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison in July.
Former US marine Paul Whelan has also been released as part of the major prisoner swap
Whelan, 54, has been imprisoned in Russia since 2018 and was sentenced to 16 years in jail in 2020 on spying charges. The US has denied he was ever involved in espionage operations.
His brother David Whelan, who had campaigned tirelessly to spotlight his brother’s plight, said his work as family spokesman is finally over as he praised the media for reporting on it.
‘It is vital that he be given agency over his life again, something the Kremlin took away for so many years,’ he said.
‘I cannot adequately express my deep admiration for your hard work and courage. Some of you were hounded from Russia, or labeled foreign agents, and took great risks to follow Paul’s story,.’
Radio journalist Kurmasheva was arrested in October last year and charged with failing to register as a foreign agent.
Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Russian-British dissident journalist also jailed in Russia, was also reported to have disappeared from view, prompting speculation he is among those released.
Kara-Murza, 42, was arrested in April 2022 just hours after a CNN interview was broadcast in which he stated Russia was run by a ‘regime of murderers‘.
He was sentenced to 25 years in a Siberian jail in a tiny punishment cell just ten feet long and five feet wide.
Radio journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, who was arrested in October last year and charged with failing to register as a foreign agent, has also been released
A Russian government plane is seen on the tarmac after landing at Esenboga Airport in Ankara, Turkey
Four Russians detained in the US on charges including murder, cyber crime, smuggling and money laundering were thought to possibly be part of the exchange.
The Moscow Times reported the individuals recently disappeared from the federal inmates’ database in America.
Details of exactly who has been released have not been made public yet.
The Kremlin has previously pushed for the release of convicted assassin Vadim Krasikov in previous prisoner swaps, raising speculation that he could be among those freed.
It comes after Slovenian broadcaster, N1 Slovenia, reported on a possible deal being struck earlier this week.
The reports cited an exchange including the US, Germany, Russia and Belarus.
The prisoner swap is the biggest between the United States and Russia since the end of the Cold War.
According to the anonymous source cited by the Moscow Times, Russian authorities have made ‘great efforts to keep the information inside Russia as much a secret as possible until the last moment.’
The developments came as recently as Wednesday, when Kremlin military aircraft reportedly flew to isolated regions in Russia where political prisoners are being held.
Gershkovich, seen during happier times, was detained in March 2023 on espionage charges that the United States says are illegitimate. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison in July
Whelan, a corporate security executive from Michigan, was arrested in 2018 in Moscow, where he was attending a friend’s wedding
The US government has repeatedly stated its commitment to freeing both men, who they say were wrongfully detained.
The son of Soviet emigres who settled in New Jersey, Gershkovich was fluent in Russian and moved to Russia in 2017 to work for The Moscow Times newspaper before being hired by the WSJ in 2022.
He was the first US journalist arrested on spying charges in Russia since the Cold War.
Russian prosecutors alleged that Gershkovich had gathered secret information on the orders of the US Central Intelligence Agency about a company that manufactures tanks for Moscow’s war in Ukraine, which he and his employer denied.
Officers of the FSB security service arrested him on March 29, 2023, at a steakhouse in Yekaterinburg, 900 miles east of Moscow. He had since been held in Moscow’s Lefortovo prison.
Whelan, a corporate security executive from Michigan, was arrested in 2018 in Moscow, where he was attending a friend’s wedding.
He maintains his innocence, saying the charges were fabricated.
Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich stands listening to the verdict in a glass cage of a courtroom inside the building of ‘Palace of justice,’ in Yekaterinburg, Russia, on Friday, July 19, 2024
To mark the one-year anniversary of his arrest, the Wall Street Journal published a powerful blank page with the headline: ‘His Story Should Be Here’
Details about the conditions both men have been facing behind bars are scant and in recent days, Whelan’s lawyer said she had lost track of where he was being housed.
His family previously told how he had been attacked in prison at the remote IK-17 camp in Mordovia by an inmate who allegedly punched him in his face and broke his glasses.
US officials have repeatedly accused Russia of using Gershkovich and Whelan as bargaining chips for a possible prisoner exchange.
Russia previously pushed for the release of former Federal Security Service (FSB) colonel Krasikov in prisoner negotiations around the release of US basketball star Brittney Griner, who was detained on drug possession charges.
Krasikov was convicted of gunning down a Georgia-born Chechen separatist in broad daylight in a central Berlin park in June 2019.
He rode up to his victim on a bicycle and executed him in Berlin’s Kleine Tiergarten park in December 2021. A German court called it a ‘state-contracted killing.’
Griner was ultimately released in exchange for arms dealer Viktor Bout.
Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Russian-British dissident journalist also jailed in Russia, was also reported to have disappeared from view, prompting speculation he is among those released
Russia previously pushed for the release of former Federal Security Service (FSB) colonel and convicted hitman Vadim Krasikov as part of prisoner swap negotiations sparking speculation he could be released although this has not been confirmed
Among the prisoners released were at least seven Russian dissidents who were being held in jail in their homeland.
Kremlin critics Ilya Yashin, 41, Alexandra Skochilenko, 33, Oleg Orlov, 71, Lilia Chanysheva, 42, Ksenia Fadeeva, 32, Vadim Ostanin and Andrei Pivovarov have all now been released, CNN reports.
Many of those on the list were allies of former opposition leader Alexey Navalgny.
Navalgny was reportedly on a list of potential prisoners who could be part of a prisoner exchange until his mysterious death aged 47 in a penal colony in Kharp, Russia in February.