WNBA star, Brittney Griner, who was held for months in Russian prisons on drug charges, has been released.
The United States and Russia have exchanged the jailed basketball star Brittney Griner for notorious arms dealer, Viktor Bout, held in an American prison for 12 years.
The swap brought an end to an ordeal that sparked intensive high-level negotiations between the U.S. and the Kremlin to secure her freedom.
“She’s safe. She’s on a plane. She’s on her way home,” President Biden said at the White House, announcing the exchange.
“After months of being unjustly detained in Russia, held under intolerable circumstances, Brittney will soon be back in the arms of her loved ones and she should have been there all along. This is a day we’ve worked toward for a long time. We never stopped pushing for her release.”
Bout – widely known as the “merchant of death” – has arrived back in Moscow, Russian media reported.
“In the middle of the night they simply woke me up and said Get your things together and that was it,” Bout said in brief remarks to a reporter from national television, after landing in Russia.
Bout reportedly came down the airplane steps carrying a bouquet of flowers before embracing his mother and his wife.
CBS News was first to report the swap, which took place in the United Arab Emirates, citing a U.S. official.
According to a joint Saudi-UAE statement, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman played a leading role in mediation efforts, along with UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan.
The heir to the Saudi throne has good relations with Russia’s Vladimir Putin and in September he helped co-ordinate a complex swap of hundreds of prisoners held by Russia and Ukraine.
But the White House denied any mediation had been involved.
“The only countries that negotiated this deal were the United States and Russia,” said press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
The exchange agreement negotiated with Moscow in recent weeks was given final approval by President Biden within just the last week, according to sources familiar with the deal.
The elaborate swap involved two private planes bringing the pair to Abu Dhabi airport from Moscow and Washington, and then flying them home.
Footage on Russian state media – apparently provided by Russian security services – showed them crossing on the tarmac with their respective teams.
“The Russian citizen has been returned to his homeland,” the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement.
Five former U.S. officials told CBS News the agreement had been reached as of last Thursday.
The president said he spoke to Griner by phone from the Oval Office, where he was joined by Griner’s wife Cherelle, Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
The president dismissed the “show trial in Russia” that landed her in prison and said “she didn’t ask for special treatment.”
To secure Griner’s release, the President ordered Bout to be freed and returned to Russia. Biden signed the commutation order cutting short Bout’s 25-year federal prison sentence.
Speaking in the Oval Office, Brittney Griner’s wife Cherelle praised the efforts of the Biden administration in securing her release: “I’m just standing here overwhelmed with emotions.”
Per standard procedure for freed U.S. prisoners, Griner was expected to quickly undergo a medical evaluation.
Mr. Biden said that he was “glad to be able to say Brittney is in good spirits,” and that she was looking forward to getting home.
Notably, the Griner-for-Bout exchange leaves retired U.S. Marine Paul Whelan imprisoned in Russia. Whelan has been in Russian custody for nearly four years.
He was convicted on espionage charges that the U.S. has called false.
“We’ve not forgotten about Paul Whelan,” Mr. Biden said Thursday, adding “we will never give up” on securing his release.
U.S. officials told reporters that it became clear in talks with the Russians that the prospect of securing the release of both Griner and Whelan in exchange for Bout was a nonstarter, with one official saying the U.S. had “a choice between bringing home one particular American — Brittney Griner — or bringing home none.”
Whelan told CNN in a phone call on Thursday that he was happy Griner was free, but said he was “greatly disappointed that more has not been done to secure my release, especially as the four-year anniversary of my arrest is coming up.”
Griner, a 32-year-old star center for the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury, was detained at a Russian airport in February and later pleaded guilty to charges stemming from the discovery of cannabis-derived oil cartridges in her luggage.
Griner said she didn’t mean to bring the cartridges with her when she traveled to the country to play in a Russian basketball league during the WNBA offseason.
After five months of stalled diplomacy and various permutations of potential swap arrangements — including a previously unreported offer by the U.S. this past summer to send two prisoners back to Russia for the two Americans — sources say the one-for-one exchange came together over the last two weeks.
Whelan, who once worked as a corporate security contractor, was in Moscow for a friend’s wedding when he was detained at a hotel in December 2018.
Russian authorities later sentenced him to 16 years in prison for espionage — a charge the U.S. and Whelan denied.
This month marks the fourth anniversary of Whelan’s time in Russian custody.
Bout, who was most recently held at a federal prison in Marion, Illinois, was arrested by the Drug Enforcement Agency in Thailand following a sting operation in 2008.
He was convicted of conspiring to kill Americans and began his 25-year sentence a decade ago.
Griner’s arrest coincided with the February start to Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, and all U.S. dealings with the Kremlin have been complicated by that conflict.
The U.S. has said both Griner and Whelan were “wrongfully detained,” and officials have suspected that Russia has been using the American prisoners as leverage.
Griner’s return for Bout marks the Biden administration’s second prisoner swap with Russia.
In April, the U.S. traded Konstantin Yaroshenko, a Russian smuggler convicted of conspiring to import cocaine, for Trevor Reed, a former U.S. Marine who had been imprisoned in Russia for nearly three years.
CBS News learned last Thursday that the Griner-for-Bout swap was in the offing but agreed to a White House request to hold the reporting because officials expressed grave concern about the fragility of the then-emerging deal.
The Biden administration officials warned that making details of the swap public beforehand would almost certainly lead Russia to pull out of the agreement and potentially endanger Griner’s well-being.
President Biden spoke Thursday afternoon with the sister of imprisoned Marine Paul Whelan, a U.S. official confirmed to CBS News.
The official said that Mr. Biden expressed to Elizabeth Whelan his commitment to bringing Paul Whelan home.
Mr. Biden has not himself yet spoken with Paul Whelan, the official added, in part because the Russians must approve all Whelan’s communication to the outside world.
CBS