Brittney Griner’s defense team has cautiously welcomed the prospect of including the WNBA star in a prisoner swap, as Russia said talks between Moscow and Washington over the prisoner swap were “in progress”.
“Griner’s Russian defense team learned of the US offer through the news… In any case, we would be very happy if Brittney could come home and we hope it will be soon,” lawyers for the WNBA star Maria Blagovolina and Alexander Boykov. in a statement.
“The defense team is not involved in exchange discussions,” the lawyers added.
On Wednesday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters that the US had offered a deal to Russia aimed at getting Griner and another jailed American, former US Marine Paul Whelan.
CNN and the New York Times have reported that Washington was willing to exchange Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, who is serving a 25-year prison sentence in the United States, as part of a deal.
Commenting on Blinken’s remarks, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told reporters Thursday that negotiations between Moscow and Washington on the prisoner exchange are ongoing but have not “yielded concrete results.” .
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that “so far there are no agreements in this area.”
Griner was arrested at a Moscow airport in February. She admitted in court earlier this month that she had vaporizer cans containing cannabis oil when she arrived in Russia, but claims she had no criminal intent and that the cans ended up in her luggage accidentally. Griner faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted.
The next hearing is scheduled for August 2.
“From a legal point of view, an exchange is only possible after a court verdict,” Griner’s lawyers said.
Griner’s high-profile arrest has also drawn new attention to the plight of Whelan, a former U.S. Marine who was arrested in a Moscow hotel in 2018 and sentenced to 16 years in prison two years later, accused of espionage Whelan has repeatedly denied the charges against him.
Whelan’s lawyer, Vladimir Zherebenkov, told the Guardian on Thursday that he believed Moscow wanted Bout to be part of a swap for his client.
According to Zherebenkov, Russia in 2020 offered to swap Whelan for Bout and Russian driver Konstantin Yaroshenko, an offer he claimed was rejected by the US.
Zherebenkov said that at the time, an American diplomat met with Whelan in prison and said the trade was “unrealistic because Russia will start kidnapping our citizens, charge them illegally, and then trade for they”.
Zherebenkov said he believed such an exchange would take place and was realistic.
“Now I think a trade is realistic because, as I understand it, the Russian side has always been for a trade, and in this case, that now seems to be the position of the American side.”
Russian officials have repeatedly expressed interest in the release of Bout, an arms dealer once dubbed the “Merchant of Death.”
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Bout’s wife, Alla, told the RIA Novosti news agency on Wednesday evening that her husband was not aware of any negotiations.
“We spoke on the phone yesterday. Victor knows nothing about the negotiations between Russia and the US. Of course, we assume that these talks could be a place of conversation … but we both have no information about the talks,” he said .
If successful, the prisoner exchange of Whelan and Griner would mark the second high-profile exchange between the two adversaries this year. On April 27, Russia and the US conducted a prisoner exchange exchanging former US Marine Trevor Reed for Yaroshenko, who was convicted of conspiracy to smuggle cocaine into the United States.