Political prisoners and hostages have been freed, but at a cost.
Last night, the anticipation of a prisoner swap between Russia and the West was nearly unbearable for advocates of prisoners held in Russia. My own sleep was fitful. Among those who might be released were journalists, dissidents, and human-rights workers I knew in Russia, or whose work I’ve covered as a reporter.
The deal is in many ways the fruit of years-long negotiations involving multiple countries, but it really came unstuck last month, says Christo Grozev, a researcher who tracks Russian intelligence operations. And according to advocates, the swap includes a few of Russia’s domestic political prisoners, to be released alongside the foreign hostages. In return for all of them, Russia is expected to recover a contract murderer and a Russian couple caught spying in Europe, among other detainees abroad.
“It’s all very bittersweet,” Grozev told me yesterday: Political prisoners and foreign hostages were to be freed, but President Vladimir Putin will have incentive to continue amassing “swap capital” by taking hostages for future trades.
“My mother came along as a bonus to Brooke, but at least in the U.S.S.R., they tried to create a clean picture,” Matthews told me. He has written a memoir about his family history and the spy swap that allowed his parents to meet and marry. Brooke was never proved to have worked for a foreign government while in the Soviet Union, but, Matthews pointed out, he was arrested for carrying anti-Soviet literature, “while Evan Gershkovich, who is flying home today, was a completely innocent journalist.
