Biden is ready for emergency measures for the return of Americans convicted in Russia

President Joe Biden is willing to go to extraordinary lengths and make tough decisions to bring home Americans convicted in Russia. That’s according to a written statement released Tuesday by U.S. Assistant to the President for National Security Jake Sullivan in connection with the Moscow City Court’s decision to uphold the sentence of American basketball player Brittney Griner, convicted of drug smuggling to nine years in a penal colony.

“In recent weeks, the Biden administration has continued to engage with Russia through all available channels and has worked hard to bring Brittney home and to support and advocate for other Americans detained in Russia, including the wrongfully detained Paul Whelan. President Biden has demonstrated that he is willing to go to extraordinary lengths and make tough decisions to bring Americans home, as his administration has successfully done in countries around the world,” Sullivan said.

“We are aware that Brittney Griner continues to be wrongfully detained under intolerable conditions after she had to undergo another sham trial today. President Biden has made it clear that Brittney must be released immediately,” Sullivan argued.

The Washington administration, generally by the phrase “extraordinary measures and tough decisions,” meant, in effect, a possible pardon of convicts in the United States as part of an exchange of its citizens incarcerated in other countries.

Exchange Negotiations.
The U.S. administration is seeking the release of U.S. basketball players Brittney Greiner and Paul Whelan who are serving prison sentences in Russia.

Greiner pleaded guilty July 7 in a court in Khimki, near Moscow, to smuggling hashish oil, but said she did not intend to commit the crime. The athlete was arrested in February after arriving in Moscow on a flight from New York on suspicion of trying to smuggle hashish oil into Russia through Sheremetyevo airport. She did not appeal her arrest. The U.S. government claims that Greiner was wrongfully detained by Russian authorities, without explaining the basis for that conclusion. Earlier, reports surfaced that Victor Bout, a Russian businessman serving a prison sentence in the United States, might be exchanged for Griner.

Whelan, who holds U.S., Canadian and Irish citizenship, as well as British citizenship, was detained during a spy raid on December 28, 2018, by Russian FSB officers in a room at the Metropol Hotel in Moscow. The investigation department of the FSB opened a criminal case against him under Article 276 of the Russian Criminal Code (“Espionage”). The Moscow City Court found Whelan guilty and sentenced him to 16 years in a strict regime colony.