Brittney Griner conviction: Russia ready to discuss prisoner swap with U.S.
Global News
The Russian foreign minister said President Putin and U.S. President Biden had previously agreed on a diplomatic channel that should be used to discuss possible prisoner exchanges.
Russia said on Friday it was ready to discuss a prisoner swap with the United States in private, a day after a Russian court jailed U.S. basketball star Brittney Griner for nine years for a drugs offense.
The case against Griner, a two-time Olympic gold medallist and Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) star, plunged her into a geopolitical maelstrom after Russia sent troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Joe Biden had previously agreed on a diplomatic channel that should be used to discuss possible prisoner exchanges.
“We are ready to discuss this topic, but within the framework of the channel that was agreed upon by presidents Putin and Biden,” Lavrov said during a visit to Cambodia.
“If the Americans decide to once again resort to public diplomacy … that is their business and I would even say that it is their problem.”
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Washington was prepared to engage with Moscow through the established diplomatic channels. He said Griner’s conviction highlighted her wrongful detention by Russia and further compounded the injustice that had been done to her.
The Kremlin has remained tight-lipped on the prospect of a swap, saying that if prisoner exchanges were discussed in the media, they would never happen.
“The Americans have already made that mistake, suddenly deciding to use megaphone diplomacy to resolve these issues,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
This year, the toy drive will support nearly 200 Ukrainian children in the Central Okanagan.
The choice of Trump's former acting attorney general Matt Whitaker is an unusual one, given his background in law enforcement and not in foreign policy or diplomacy.
Israel has continued to pound Hezbollah throughout the cease-fire attempts, and rockets have continued to rain down on northern Israel.
The precautionary step came after Russian officials promised a response to President Joe Biden’s decision to let Ukraine strike targets on Russian soil with U.S.-made missiles.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken recognized González in a post on X in which he also demanded “respect for the will” of Venezuelan voters.
Officials were worried the hamsters would target the plane's electrical wiring system.
Marius Borg Høiby is facing yet another charge after a slew of accusations in recent months.
Uranium enriched at 60 per cent purity is just a short, technical step away from weapons-grade levels of 90 per cent, according to the UN report.
The alleged developments marked a worrying new escalation in the conflict that has repeatedly ratcheted up international tensions.
The foreign ministries of Finland and Germany said that the damage raised suspicion of sabotage.
Putin’s endorsement of the new nuclear deterrent policy comes on the 1,000th day after he sent troops into Ukraine, on Feb. 24, 2022.