As families and supporters of those released by Russia rejoiced following a major U.S.-Russian prisoner exchange this week, supporters of American citizens and political prisoners still trapped in Russian and Belarusian prisons urged Western governments not to forget about their plight.
The August 1 prisoner swap involving the United States, Russia, and several European countries included three high-profile U.S. citizens, as well as five German citizens jailed in Russia and Belarus and eight Russian political activists held in Russia in connection with their opposition to President Vladimir Putin.
But several other Americans that Washington has designated as unjustly imprisoned and hundreds of Russian citizens seen as political prisoners remain behind bars in Russia, prompting calls for Western governments to vigorously pursue their release as well.
“They remain in torturous conditions. They are in grave danger. We simply must not forget about them, even against the euphoric backdrop that it was possible to pull someone out,” self-exiled Russian opposition politician Dmitry Gudkov told Current Time after the prisoner swap, which saw eight Russians -- including a convicted assassin and spies -- returned to Moscow from Western custody.
The Russian citizens released in the exchange included prominent Kremlin enemies Ilya Yashin and Vladimir Kara-Murza, as well as activists from the network of Aleksei Navalny, the opposition leader whose release the White House said it was also negotiating for before his mysterious death in a Russian prison in February.
But nearly 800 Russians designated as political prisoners by the venerable Russian rights group Memorial remain incarcerated by Putin’s government, a figure that has spiked amid a crackdown on dissent following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Sergei Davidis, the leader of Memorial's Support Of Political Prisoners project, said this figure is an undercount given the time it takes to analyze cases, and that in many cases authorities have not made public information about specific criminal cases.
“So, unfortunately, the total number of political prisoners in Russia is much higher than anybody can list. Our number is a minimum, reliable estimation,” Davidis told RFE/RL.
Davidis said that while it would have been impossible to release all Russian political prisoners under the August 1 exchange, he believes the prisoner swap can give some hope “that they can also be released one day.”
One person who raised the plight of Russian political prisoners was the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, one of the three U.S. citizens released in the exchange, alongside RFE/RL journalist Alsu Kurmasheva and Paul Whelan, a Michigan corporate security executive.
Speaking on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington, D.C., after disembarking from the plane that brought him home on August 1, Gershkovich said it was great to see that Russian political prisoners were released but that “basically everybody” he was imprisoned with “was a political prisoner."
“Nobody knows them publicly. They have, you know, various political beliefs…. I think it would be good to see if we could potentially do something about them as well. And I’d like to talk to people about that in the next weeks and months,” Gershkovich said.
'Absolutely Unfair'
Among those left out of the prisoner swap were several U.S. citizens who remain incarcerated in Russia but who have not been designated by Washington as “wrongfully detained,” a status the U.S. government can grant to Americans held abroad that prioritizes efforts to secure their release.
These include:
- Marc Fogel, a teacher arrested at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport while carrying a small amount of marijuana that he said was for medical purposes;
- Gordon Black, a U.S. Army staff sergeant convicted in Vladivostok of theft and making death threats against a woman he was romantically involved with;
- Robert Gilman, a former U.S. Marine sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison after being convicted of assaulting a Russian police officer while allegedly drunk;
- Eugene Spector, a former pharmaceutical executive in Russia currently jailed on espionage allegations;
- Robert Woodland, a Russian-born man who was adopted by American parents as a child and sentenced to 12 1/2 years in prison in July on a conviction of drug possession;
- Michael Leake, a musician and former U.S. military paratrooper sentenced to 13 years in prison in July by a Moscow court on a drug-possession conviction;
- And Ksenia Karelina, a dual U.S.-Russian citizen charged with treason over an alleged $51 donation to a U.S-based organization that provides aid and assistance to Ukraine.
In an August 1 statement on the prisoner exchange, U.S. President Joe Biden said he would “not stop working until every American wrongfully detained or held hostage around the world is reunited with their family.”
“Too many families are suffering and separated from their loved ones, and I have no higher priority as president than bringing those Americans home,” Biden said.
Relatives and loved ones of the U.S. citizens who remain imprisoned in Russia, however, expressed anger and disappointment that they were not included in the prisoner swap.
"This is absolutely unfair that they did not bring him home," Fogel’s sister, Anne Fogel, told PBS News.
She noted that her brother was convicted under the same statute as American professional basketball star Brittney Griner, whose release was secured by Washington in a December 2022 prisoner swap with Russia, but has not been designated as “wrongfully detained” like Griner was.
"Marc has never been prioritized," Fogel said.
The boyfriend of Karelina, meanwhile, was quoted by Reuters as saying that he was happy for the three U.S. citizens freed in the prisoner swap, which he said “makes me hopeful.”
“At the same time, I'm heartbroken and sad.… She's not on the list," he said.
U.S. Senator Jim Risch of Idaho, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, cited Fogel and Karelina in a statement, saying “we must not forget those left behind” and called on the U.S. government to redouble its efforts to secure their release.
U.S. Representative Ted Lieu (Democrat-California), who represents Los Angeles, where Karelina lives, said her release and that of other Americans still imprisoned in Russia “must remain a diplomatic priority moving forward.”
Belarusian, Ukrainian Political Prisoners
Following the August 1 prisoner swap, Belarusian opposition leader Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya also called on the global community not to forget political prisoners incarcerated by the regime of authoritarian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka.
The exchange included German citizen Rico Krieger, 30, who was sentenced to death in June on charges of mercenary and terrorism activities in Belarus before he was pardoned by Lukashenka on July 30.
“I welcome the release of political prisoners from Russian prisons today. Now, it's time to focus all our efforts on freeing the political prisoners in Belarus. Many are held in inhumane conditions, deprived of urgently needed medical help & contact with the outside world,” Tsikhanouskaya said in a tweet.
The Belarusian human rights group Vyasna has designated nearly 1,400 people as political prisoners of Lukashenka’s regime, which has served as a key Kremlin ally in Russia’s all-out war on Ukraine.
That war has also resulted in what has been estimated as thousands of Ukrainian civilians detained by Russia. Ukraine’s parliamentary human rights commissioner, Dmytro Lubinets, said in June that at least 14,000 Ukrainian civilians are currently being held captive by Russia.
Davidis of Memorial said that these Ukrainians should also be considered political prisoners, but that it is exceedingly difficult to obtain information about them and their cases.
“They are deprived of their liberty because of obvious political motivation,” Davidis told RFE/RL.
