WASHINGTON: Former US diplomat Bill Richardson said Sunday that he was “optimistic” about efforts to negotiate a “two for two” prisoner swap with Russia that would free US basketball star Brittney Griner and another American.
Richardson, a former ambassador to the UN, has negotiated the release of several Americans held in other countries. Reports last month said he was expected to travel to Russia for talks over Griner, who on Thursday was sentenced to nine years in prison on a drug charge.
While insisting Sunday that he is only a “catalyst” in any negotiations, Richardson’s mention of a “two-for-two” swap including Griner suggested inside knowledge.
“My view is, I’m optimistic,” he told ABC’s “This Week.”
“I think she’s going to be freed, I think she has the right strategy of contrition, there’s going to be a prisoner swap — though I think it will be two for two, involving Paul Whelan.”
Whelan is a former US Marine who was convicted of espionage in June 2020 and sentenced to 16 years in prison. He has insisted on his innocence.
His case and Griner’s have been enmeshed in the deep US-Russia tensions since Russian troops invaded Ukraine in February.
But recent comments from both sides — including from US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov — have suggested signs of movement, and US President Joe Biden has faced repeated calls to arrange a deal.
Reports suggested that Russian arms trafficker Viktor Bout, known as the “Merchant of Death,” might be freed in exchange for Griner and Whelan. The Kremlin has long sought his release.
But Richardson’s mention of a “two for two” swap raises questions about who the second Russian in the equation might be.
And some Americans have asked why Marc Fogel, a US citizen serving a 14-year sentence in Russia on marijuana charges — which he said he had for medicinal purposes — has not been mentioned.
Griner was sentenced Thursday to nine years in a Russian penal colony and ordered to pay a fine of one million rubles ($16,590) for smuggling narcotics.
She was arrested at a Moscow airport for possessing vape cartridges with a small amount of cannabis oil.
The 31-year-old, who was in Russia to play for the professional Yekaterinburg team during her off-season from the Phoenix Mercury, said the substance was prescribed by a US doctor to relieve pain.
The two-time Olympic gold medalist and Women’s NBA champion pleaded guilty but said she did not intend to break the law.
Richardson is a prominent Democrat, having served in the US Congress, as governor of New Mexico, and both as UN envoy and energy secretary in the Bill Clinton administration.
Since then, he has worked as a discreet go-between in several sensitive hostage talks with foreign countries, including North Korea. In November 2021 he helped secure the release of US journalist Danny Fenster from a prison in Myanmar.
Ex-US envoy Richardson ‘optimistic’ Griner will be freed
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Ex-US envoy Richardson ‘optimistic’ Griner will be freed
- Bill Richardson: ‘I think she’s going to be freed, I think she has the right strategy of contrition, there’s going to be a prisoner swap — though I think it will be two for two, involving Paul Whelan’
- Some Americans have asked why Marc Fogel, a US citizen serving a 14-year sentence in Russia on marijuana charges — which he said he had for medicinal purposes — has not been mentioned
Kabul shakes as 5.8-magnitude earthquake hits eastern Afghanistan
- The 5.8-magnitude quake struck a mountainous area around 130 kilometers northeast of Kabul
- Earthquakes are common in Afghanistan, particularly along the Hindu Kush mountain range
KABUL: A strong earthquake rocked eastern Afghanistan including the capital Kabul on Friday, AFP journalists and residents said.
The 5.8-magnitude quake struck a mountainous area around 130 kilometers (80 miles) northeast of Kabul, the United States Geological Survey said.
The epicenter was near several remote villages and struck at 5:39 p.m. (1309 GMT), just as people in the Muslim-majority country were sitting down to break their Ramadan fast.
“We were waiting to do our iftars, a heavy earthquake shook us. It was very strong, it went on for almost 30 seconds,” said Zilgay Talabi, a resident of Khenj district near of the epicenter.
“Everyone was horrified and scared,” Talabi told AFP, saying he feared “landslides and avalanches” may follow.
Power was briefly cut in parts of the capital, while east of Kabul an AFP journalist in Nangarhar province also felt it.
Earthquakes are common in Afghanistan, particularly along the Hindu Kush mountain range, near where the Eurasian and Indian tectonic plates meet.
Haqmal Saad, spokesman for the Panjshir province police, described the quake as “very strong” and said the force was “gathering information on the ground.”
Mohibullah Jahid, head of Panjshir Natural Disaster Management agency, told AFP he was in touch with several officials in the area.
The district governor had told him there were reports of “minor damage, such as cracks in the walls, but we have not received anything serious, such as the collapse of houses or anything similar,” Jahid said.
Residents in Bamiyan and Wardak provinces, west of Kabul, told AFP they also felt the earthquake.
In Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, rescue service official Bilal Ahmad Faizi said the quake was felt in border areas.
In August last year, a shallow 6.0-magnitude quake in the country’s east wiped out mountainside villages and killed more than 2,200 people.
Weeks later, a 6.3-magnitude quake in northern Afghanistan killed at least 27 people.
Large tremors in western Herat, near the Iranian border, in 2023, and in Nangarhar province in 2022, killed hundreds and destroyed thousands of homes.
Many homes in the predominantly rural country, which has been devastated by decades of war, are shoddily built.
Poor communication networks and infrastructure in mountainous Afghanistan have hampered disaster responses in the past, preventing authorities from reaching far-flung villages for hours or even days before they could assess the extent of the damage.
