Several Americans and other Westerners have been freed, along with a number of Russian citizens who had been jailed in their own country, in a major prisoner swap involving multiple nations. Why did President Vladimir Putin's government release them, and why now?
Here are three reasons.
'Patriots' And Prisoners
During his 25 years as president or prime minister, Putin has increasingly sent signals to Russians about the kind of people he sees, or wants them to believe he sees, as valuable: loyal figures who serve what he casts as the interests of the state, even if -- and perhaps especially if -- their actions are an affront to the West.
These signals have become clearer than ever since Putin launched the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. He has decorated soldiers from units accused of committing atrocities in the neighboring country and has clamped down ever harder on all forms of dissent, and particularly anti-war activism, at home.
Putin, a longtime officer of the Soviet KGB and the head of the Federal Security Service (FSB) before his rise to the heights of power, has repeatedly sought to show that the Kremlin elevates and protects those it sees as the right kind of Russian, including those seen as loyal members of the security services.
A glaring example of Putin's projected values is Vadim Krasikov, the former FSB officer seen as the central figure -- at least for Putin -- of the prisoner swap. Krasikov had been serving a life sentence in Germany for the 2019 murder, in broad daylight in a prominent Berlin park, of Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, a Georgian citizen and former field commander in Chechnya.
Prosecutors in Germany claimed Moscow ordered the assassination because Khangoshvili had commanded separatist forces in Russia's North Caucasus region from 2000 to 2004 in the Second Chechen War, which helped cement Putin's authority when he publicly played the lead role in pursuing it as prime minister in 1999 and then as president starting in 2000.
In an interview with U.S. media figure Tucker Carlson in February, Putin praised Krasikov without naming him, referring to "a person [who], due to patriotic sentiments, eliminated a bandit in one of the European capitals," and made clear that he wanted to secure the convicted murderer's release and return to Russia.
Enemies Of The State?
The flip side of holding up people like Krasikov as examples is the Russian state's mounting pressure on political opponents, civil society groups, and dissenters, particularly those -- be they well-known or unknown to the general public -- who have spoken out against the war on Ukraine.
Several of the Russians who had been imprisoned in their own country before the swap had been convicted, in trials seen in the West as entirely politically motivated, of treason or involvement in purported "extremist" activities. Others were found guilty of discrediting the Russian military or spreading what Putin's government deems false information about the war against Ukraine.
While professing to take no interest in the cases against these defendants over the years and avoiding even mentioning the name of Aleksei Navalny, the political foe who died in suspicious circumstances in an Arctic prison, Putin has repeatedly said that anyone who breaks the law must be punished.
By releasing them, however, he sends a signal that's the opposite of the message delivered about Krasikov: Good riddance to people the Kremlin portrays as enemies of the state and pawns of the West.
In March 2022, shortly after launching the invasion of Ukraine, Putin said Russians "will always be able to distinguish true patriots from scum and traitors and will simply spit them out like a fly that has accidentally flown into their mouths."
At the same time, Putin can claim to be acting out of humanitarian interests, as he has done in the past with prisoners such as Mikhail Khodorkovsky.
Meanwhile, the death of Navalny -- which his widow and many others blame on Putin -- has enabled Russia to conduct the prisoner exchange without releasing the one opponent he may not have wanted to see at liberty, even abroad. Allies of Navalny had claimed that a swap deal that would have included his release and Krasikov's was in the works when he died.
The November Factor
The prisoner swap follows U.S.-Russian negotiations on the issue and comes just over three months before the U.S. presidential election. President Joe Biden, who has been vocal about the desire to secure the release of Americans held in Russia and elsewhere on what Washington says are spurious charges, withdrew his bid for reelection last month.
U.S.-Russian ties are close to a nadir, extremely strained by Moscow's all-out invasion of Ukraine. Whoever wins the U.S. election on November 5, former President Donald Trump or Vice President Kamala Harris, releasing several Americans held in Russia cleans the slate to some degree ahead of the vote and the next U.S. president's four-year term.
Simply put, it alleviates one major irritant in relations between the two countries, one reason for the United States to be tough on Russia. Putin, who appears to be focused almost solely on the war against Ukraine, might try to use the prisoner exchange to undermine U.S. support for aid to Ukraine, particular in Congress, or to seek concessions on sanctions imposed over the war.
The Kremlin may see "an opportunity to try to isolate Ukraine," said Sam Greene, a professor at the King's Russia Institute at King's College London. "By making this exchange, Moscow is seeking to demonstrate that (a) it can negotiate in good faith, and (b) it is willing to do deals with the West."
"This will strengthen the hand of those who have been calling for Western governments to impose a cease-fire on Kyiv and weaken those who see such a cease-fire as detrimental to Ukrainian and European security in the near, medium and long terms," Greene wrote on X.
"Sowing doubt in the West about the utility of continuing to support Ukraine may be enough of a win -- but the Kremlin is taking a risk," Greene added. "If it doesn't work, and if support continues, what bargaining chips does it have left? Only escalation, really."
Despite his own public suggestions to the contrary, many analysts say Putin would prefer Trump win the election, and there had been speculation that the Kremlin might deny Biden the satisfaction of securing the release of Americans but approve a swap after the election if Trump were to win -- again, with the hope of smoothing the path for U.S. concessions on Ukraine or regional security issues.
However, doing so could come across to audiences at home as obsequious, and if Harris wins as an unneeded concession, so the Kremlin may have considered it safest to act now. In addition, Biden is a known quantity, and the Kremlin might be less confident about how Trump or Harris would approach the matter.
On the other hand, the timing of the exchange may have little to do with the U.S. election cycle, hinging more on when negotiations advanced to the point at which a swap was possible, as well as factors such as Putin's eagerness to bring Krasikov back to Russia.
Meanwhile, despite the scope of the swap, several Americans and others apparently still held in Russia -- and seen widely in the West as hostages -- remain as bargaining chips for the Kremlin. And if disputes arise in the West about the wisdom of freeing the convicted murderer Krasikov, Putin will welcome that development.
In any case, regardless of the timing, the prisoner exchange put Russia in a place where Putin, over a quarter-century in power, has always been eager for it to be: at the table with the United States.
