Online trackers monitoring prisoner movements in Russia have sounded the alarm about a possible prisoner swap with the West, with the whereabouts of several high-profile prisoners, including those of American prisoner Paul Whelan, unknown.
At least seven notable Russian dissidents have been unexpectedly transferred in recent days, in addition to Whelan and Russian-British prisoner Vladimir Kara-Murza, Reuters report. The exact location of Whelan and Kara-Murza is unknown, their lawyers told the news outlet.
Russian state media RIA also reported that lawyers for Alexander Vinnik – a Russian imprisoned in the US – said he will soon be involved in an exchangerefusing to specify its exact location.
RIA said information on four Russians imprisoned in the US – Vinnik, Maxim Marchenko, Vadim Konoshchenko and Vladislav Klyushin – disappeared from a federal Bureau of Prisons database.
Whelan has been detained in Russia since 2018 and was sentenced to 16 years in prison for espionage. The US government denied that Whelan was involved in espionage operations.
He complained of being abandoned by the Biden administration after being left out of two previous prisoner swaps with Russia. Whelan is the longest-serving American imprisoned in Russia, whose charges have been disputed by the US government.
Kara-Murza is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for The Washington Post. He was sentenced to 25 years in prison for treason after criticizing the country’s invasion of Ukraine.
His lawyer, Vadim Prokhorov, wrote on Facebook on Wednesday that Kara-Murza’s legal team was not allowed to see him, adding that he is expected to appear in court on Thursday. Prokhorov speculated that his client may have been placed on a military flight flagged by online trackers bound for Moscow on Wednesday.
Kara-Murza’s last known whereabouts were in a prison hospital near Omsk, Siberia, Prokhorov said.
US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield pressed Russia’s foreign minister to release Whelan and Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich at a UN meeting earlier this month.
“We will not rest until Paul and Evan return home and Russia once and for all ceases this barbaric practice of keeping human pawns,” Thomas-Greenfield said. “And that’s a promise.”
The last prisoner exchange between the US and Russia was in 2022 to free WNBA star Brittney Griner.
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