Negotiations were underway on a prisoner exchange that would have involved swapping Alexei Navalny and two Americans for a Russian agent imprisoned in Germany when the Russian opposition leader died in prison, one of his associates said Monday.
Maria Pevchikh, who chairs Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation, said in a video address on YouTube that negotiations were in their final stages on Feb. 15 just before his death in the Polar Wolf prison colony in the Yamalo-Nenets region of northern Russia.
Pevchikh claimed that Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, who has played a role in previous exchanges involving Russian and Ukrainian prisoners of war, had conveyed to Russian President Vladimir Putin the proposal to swap Navalny for Vadim Krasikov, a convicted Russian assassin serving a life sentence in Germany. Abramovich did not respond to questions about the matter.
Two senior European security officials familiar with the negotiations confirmed that a prisoner exchange with Russia was proposed that involved Navalny and others being held in Russian prisons, in return for Krasikov.
Pevchikh claimed that Putin clearly could not accept Navalny’s release, so decided “to get rid of the bargaining chip” (Navalny) to negotiate Krasikov’s exchange for other prisoners at a later date.
She said public signs of the secret negotiations first appeared in September when the Wall Street Journal reported that U.S. officials saw an exchange involving Krasikov as a means to secure the release of two Americans, Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan, jailed in Russia for alleged espionage, after Moscow earlier brought up Krasikov’s name in prisoner swap negotiations.
The State Department has stated that Gershkovich and Whelan are being wrongfully detained.
The European security officials said Moscow had earlier made clear its interest in recovering Krasikov. The exchange under negotiation would have included Navalny, Gershkovich and potentially others. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov did not respond to a request for comment.
Initially, Germany had been reluctant to exchange Krasikov, who was convicted of carrying out an assassination on its territory on the orders of Russia’s Federal Security Service, or FSB. But Germany’s position changed once Navalny’s health deteriorated, the officials said.
Navalny’s team had warned for months that his health was suffering as a result of his dramatic weight loss and repeated punishments in solitary confinement.
The possibility of a prisoner exchange deal involving Navalny was first reported by the Wall Street Journal in September.
Russia’s investigation into Navalny’s death concluded last week that he died of “natural causes,” and the Kremlin has strongly criticized Western leaders for holding Putin responsible.
In Krasikov’s trial, German prosecutors said he was acting on the orders of Russia’s FSB when he shot and killed a former Chechen rebel, Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, in a Berlin park in broad daylight in 2019.
Pevchikh did not identify which Americans would have been included in the exchange. But Putin, in a recent interview with former Fox News television host Tucker Carlson, hinted he would be willing to exchange Wall Street Journal reporter Gershkovich, who was arrested last March and accused of espionage, for Krasikov, whom he described as acting out of “patriotic” motives.
Gershkovich, his employer and the State Department have strongly denied the Russian charges against him. State Department officials have also sought the release of Whelan, an American former Marine who was convicted of spying in 2020 and is currently serving a 16-year sentence in Russia.
Pevchikh said that she and other members of Navalny’s team, based outside Russia, had been striving for at least two years to rescue the opposition leader via a prisoner exchange on humanitarian grounds. Western officials, she said, initially lacked the political will or desire to help.
“It could and should have happened. Navalny in coming days was supposed to have been freed, because we had achieved a decision on his release,” she said. “I received confirmation that the negotiations were at the final stage on the evening of February 15. On February 16, Alexei was killed.”
According to her, members of Navalny’s team, fearing for his life after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine two years ago, realized that they had to find a way to free Navalny from prison.
“A swap was one of the obvious ways to save him, but initially the task seemed impossible,” she said. His team made hundreds of phone calls and dozens of trips to try to make an exchange happen, but sometimes waited weeks for responses, Pevchikh said.
“American and German officials nodded with understanding, said how important it was to help Navalny and political prisoners, shook hands, promised and did nothing.” She said Navalny’s team kept working on getting influential people to persuade Western politicians to take action.
“There were those who helped very much,” she said, adding they did not wish their names to be known.
Navalny’s team on Monday posted a notice calling for help to find a hall where Navalny’s body could be laid out for a public farewell ceremony later this week, as is traditional for Russian public figures, politicians and celebrities.
His mother has said she wants the farewell and funeral to be held in Moscow.
Russian investigators on Saturday handed Navalny’s body to his mother, Lyudmila Navalnaya, according to Ivan Zhdanov, director of the Anti-Corruption Foundation, after she had struggled with Russian officials for eight days to recover it.
Navalnaya said last week that Investigative Committee officials had pressured her to agree to a private burial at an unannounced time or they would allow her son’s body to decompose. On Friday, officials gave her a three-hour ultimatum to agree, warning her that otherwise they would bury Navalny in the prison colony, according to Zhdanov.
Peskov on Monday described the claims of pressure on Navalny’s mother for a private burial as “absurd.”
“The Kremlin has nothing to do with this. Naturally, there can be no pressure from the Kremlin. This is yet another absurd statement by [Navalny’s] followers,” he said. He added that “practically all of them” are on Russia’s list of wanted criminals.
Nearly 100,000 Russians signed a petition last week calling for Navalny’s body to be handed over to his mother, and dozens of actors, writers, activists, journalists and celebrities recorded videos demanding it.
Dixon reported from Riga, Latvia, and Mekhennet from Washington. Catherine Belton in London contributed to this report.
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