MOSCOW: A top Russian diplomat said Moscow and Washington were still engaged in sensitive negotiations over a prisoner exchange, but accused the US side of leaking details to the media.
The United States said on Dec. 5 that Russia had rejected a “new and significant” proposal for the release of Paul Whelan, a former US marine serving a 16-year sentence in Russia for spying, and US reporter Evan Gershkovich, awaiting trial in Moscow on espionage charges. Both men deny they are spies and the US has designated them as “wrongfully detained” by Russia.
Deputy Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told Interfax news agency in an interview published on Friday: “The issue of exchanges of citizens serving prison terms in Russia and the United States is extremely delicate. Decisions in this area are often hampered by being actively discussed in public.”
He said that contacts about possible exchanges were conducted by the intelligence services of both countries.
“It is interesting that the participants in these contacts on the American side insist on their complete confidentiality. We also adhere to this line, but then certain twists occur when the White House regularly arranges ‘leaks’ and begins to discuss sensitive issues in the public space.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin said last week that Moscow hoped to reach an agreement but that Washington needed to listen to Russia’s conditions, which he did not specify.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday that Washington was very actively pursuing the release of Whelan and Gershkovich and would “leave no stone unturned” to find a way of getting them home.
The two countries have agreed high-profile prisoner swaps in the past — most recently in December 2022 when Moscow traded Brittney Griner, a US basketball star convicted of a drugs offense in Russia — for Russian arms trafficker Viktor Bout.
The Wall Street Journal has vehemently denied that its reporter Gershkovich is a spy. He was detained in March and accused of trying to obtain military secrets.
Whelan, arrested in 2018, was quoted by the BBC this week as saying he felt “abandoned” by the United States and his life was “draining away” in a Russian penal colony.
The White House said on Thursday it was “very concerned” about reports that Whelan felt under physical threat in prison.
Russia calls prisoner swap talks delicate, accuses US of leaks
https://arab.news/pw4c6
Russia calls prisoner swap talks delicate, accuses US of leaks
- President Vladimir Putin said last week that Moscow hoped to reach an agreement but that Washington needed to listen to Russia’s conditions
Bangladesh mourns Khaleda Zia, its first woman prime minister
- Ousted ex-premier Sheikh Hasina, who imprisoned Zia in 2018, offers condolences on her death
- Zia’s rivalry with Hasina, both multiple-term PMs, shaped Bangladeshi politics for a generation
DHAKA: Bangladesh declared three days of state mourning on Tuesday for Khaleda Zia, its first female prime minister and one of the key figures on the county’s political scene over the past four decades.
Zia entered public life as Bangladesh’s first lady when her husband, Ziaur Rahman, a 1971 Liberation War hero, became president in 1977.
Four years later, when her husband was assassinated, she took over the helm of his Bangladesh Nationalist Party and, following the 1982 military coup led by Hussain Muhammad Ershad, was at the forefront of the pro-democracy movement.
Arrested several times during protests against Ershad’s rule, she first rose to power following the victory of the BNP in the 1991 general election, becoming the second woman prime minister of a predominantly Muslim nation, after Pakistan’s Benazir Bhutto.
Zia also served as a prime minister of a short-lived government of 1996 and came to power again for a full five-year term in 2001.
She passed away at the age of 80 on Tuesday morning at a hospital in Dhaka after a long illness.
She was a “symbol of the democratic movement” and with her death “the nation has lost a great guardian,” Bangladesh’s interim leader Muhammad Yunus said in a condolence statement, as the government announced the mourning period.
“Khaleda Zia was the three-time prime minister of Bangladesh and the country’s first female prime minister. ... Her role against President Ershad, an army chief who assumed the presidency through a coup, also made her a significant figure in the country’s politics,” Prof. Amena Mohsin, a political scientist, told Arab News.
“She was a housewife when she came into politics. At that time, she just lost her husband, but it’s not that she began politics under the shadow of her husband, president Ziaur Rahman. She outgrew her husband and built her own position.”
For a generation, Bangladeshi politics was shaped by Zia’s rivalry with Sheikh Hasina, who has served as prime minister for four terms.
Both carried the legacy of the Liberation War — Zia through her husband, and Hasina through her father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, widely known as the “Father of the Nation,” who served as the country’s first president until his assassination in 1975.
During Hasina’s rule, Zia was convicted in corruption cases and imprisoned in 2018. From 2020, she was placed under house arrest and freed only last year, after a mass student-led uprising, known as the July Revolution, ousted Hasina, who fled to India.
In November, Hasina was sentenced to death in absentia for her deadly crackdown on student protesters and remains in self-exile.
Unlike Hasina, Zia never left Bangladesh.
“She never left the country and countrymen, and she said that Bangladesh was her only address. Ultimately, it proved true,” Mohsin said.
“Many people admire Khaleda Zia for her uncompromising stance in politics. It’s true that she was uncompromising.”
On the social media of Hasina’s Awami League party, the ousted leader also offered condolences to Zia’s family, saying that her death has caused an “irreparable loss to the current politics of Bangladesh” and the BNP leadership.
The party’s chairmanship was assumed by Zia’s eldest son, Tarique Rahman, who returned to Dhaka just last week after more than 17 years in exile.
He had been living in London since 2008, when he faced multiple convictions, including an alleged plot to assassinate Hasina. Bangladeshi courts acquitted him only recently, following Hasina’s removal from office, making his return legally possible.
He is currently a leading contender for prime minister in February’s general elections.
“We knew it for many years that Tarique Rahman would assume his current position at some point,” Mohsin said.
“He should uphold the spirit of the July Revolution of 2024, including the right to freedom of expression, a free and fair environment for democratic practices, and more.”
