American smugglers in Venezuela are living in fear: Namazi, a former U.S. businessman and the 19th president of the United States
WASHINGTON — Seven Americans who had been held captive in Venezuela for years were on their way home Saturday after President Biden agreed to grant clemency to two nephews of Cilia Flores, Venezuela’s first lady, officials said. The men were sentenced to 18 years for conspiring to smuggle cocaine into the United States.
At the same time, Iran on Saturday released Siamak Namazi, a 51-year-old dual-national Iranian American businessman who had been jailed since 2015, on a temporary furlough and lifted the travel ban on his father, Baquer Namazi, an 85-year-old former official for the United Nations, according to the family’s lawyer.
The releases also come at a time of heightened global tensions that has proved dangerous for Americans traveling abroad. The basketball player was arrested in Russia for bringing drugs into the country, after the United States denounced Putin for invading Ukraine.
The release of another American, Brittney Griner, came just hours after Paul Whelan told CNN he was frustrated that more hadn’t been done to get his release.
“I was arrested for a crime that never occurred,” he said in a phone call from the penal colony where he is being held in a remote part of Russia. “I don’t understand why I’m still sitting here.”
The US, British, Canadian and Irish man who was arrested at a Moscow hotel in December for allegedly being involved in an intelligence operation told CNN on Thursday that he was happy that Griner was allowed to leave but that he was led to believe that things were about to change.
The official said on the call that this was not a situation in which they had a choice of who to bring home. “It was a choice between bringing home one particular American – Brittney Griner – or bringing home none.”
Whelan’s release and the treatment of a criminal espionner at the U.S. Prisoner’s Detention Center
“I was led to believe that things were moving in the right direction, and that the governments were negotiating and that something would happen fairly soon,” he said.
That raises a lot of concern because none of it is true. The United States may be unable to provide what they want, but this is basically political extortion by them.
I have been considered to be at a higher level than any other criminals here and not only that, but I am also being treated differently than a person from a Western country who is also charged with espionage. I am held for espionage in contrast to him, but my treatment is different at other prisons as well.
Whelan said he hopes that Biden and his administration “would do everything they could to get me home, regardless of the price they might have to pay at this point.”
“My thoughts and prayers are with them today, they have to have some mixed emotions,” Biden said. “And we’ll keep negotiating in good faith for Paul’s release, I guarantee that … I urge Russia to do the same, to ensure Paul’s health and humane treatment are maintained until we are able to bring him home.”
National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications John Kirby said Thursday that the US is “not back to square one” in its negotiations for Whelan’s release.
Paul Whelan: “Coming out to tell the world what it is like to be,” he told the cNN special correspondent
I am trying to tell the world how it is, so I am not trying to shine a negative light on Russia. I’m trying to get a message through to my governments that I need help,” he said.
“If it is a risk, then it’s a risk I am willing to take because I think the message needs to get out,” he added. I don’t know what people are looking at to get me home and I have been sitting quietly for a long time, and I’ve kind of sat quietly by for a long time.
Whelan is also worried that he himself might not make it out, telling CNN, “to be quite honest, in these conditions, who knows how I’ll come back or if I’ll come back.”
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/08/politics/paul-whelan-cnn-interview-brittney-griner/index.html
The case of Bout and Griner, a lasbian released from the Soviet prison for anti-LGBTQ: The Russian Embassy in Moscow on Monday
Only cold water is what we have. Every place is dirty. There isn’t any maintenance. Things are extremely old, you know, 30-40-50 years old, and you know, what isn’t broken doesn’t work. We don’t have cleaning supplies. The medical care is substandard at best. And we’re really on our own to take care of ourselves,” he said.
He said he tries to remain sane by reading a lot of books. He said he likes to receive letters and cards, “sports scores and news articles and things like that,” because “that sort of thing coming in for our world makes me remember that our world still exists.”
In court, Griner admitted to mistakenly packing two vape cartridges in her rush to pack her luggage — but provided documents that showed the hash oil was legally prescribed by her U.S. doctor for pain management.
There had been a lot of concern about the health of Griner, who is a lesbian, and was held in Russia. Homophobia and discrimination persist despite Russia decriminalizing homosexuality in 1993. On Monday, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed into law a bill that expanded anti-LGBTQ laws.
The report states that political prisoners are often placed in harsh conditions where they are subject to “solitary confinement or psychotropic stays in psychiatric units”. Russian law allows forced labor in the penal colonies, and some inmates have been tortured to death, the report says. There are reports of prison authorities recruiting inmates to abuse other inmates.
“As a result of intense efforts, we managed to agree with the American side on organization of an exchange of Bout for Griner,” the foreign ministry said in a statement. “The Russian citizen has been returned to his homeland.”
President Joe Biden gave final approval for the prisoner swap freeing Griner over the past week, an official familiar with the matter has told CNN, adding that the president was updated on the swap as it took place.
According to a senior administration official, the only deal we could make right now was for Griner to be released.
A decision to trade a character for a figure called the Merchant of Death is controversial. Bout, a former Soviet military officer, was serving a 25-year prison sentence in the United States on charges of conspiring to kill Americans, acquire and export anti-aircraft missiles, and provide material support to a terrorist organization. Bout has maintained that he is not guilty.
Biden spoke with Griner from the Oval Office just before making the announcement. He said she was in good spirits but needed time to heal.
“We suspect that there will be a need here for her to have access to proper health care before she’s ready and fit to get back home. Kirby doesn’t think that it will take a long time. “But again, that is going to be up to the doctors to work with the family on. That is going to be the main focus now, is just making sure that we look after her well being before she’s able to, you know, to get on her way.”
“She’s safe. She’s on a plane. She is on her way home after spending months under prison conditions in Russia, Biden said.
A former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, 48, was released from a Russian prison colony on espionage charges
The U.S. government has long resisted prisoner swaps out of concern that it could encourage the imprisonment of more Americans abroad. Biden official said the exchange for Bout shouldn’t be viewed as a new normal practice, but that there are times where there can’t be alternatives.
The official said the administration felt a “moral obligation,” as well as a policy obligation, to bring people who are being held hostage or detained home.
The mother of two said she was overwhelmed by her emotions and expressed gratitude to everyone involved in securing her wife’s release. She thanked the WNBA, Griner’s agent and others.
A two-time Olympic gold medalist and the first openly gay athlete to sign to an endorsement contract by Nike, she is a seven-time WNBA All-Star, two-time Olympian, and a two-time NBA All-Star. She also played for Russia’s UMMC Ekaterinburg basketball team during the WNBA’s offseason.
She was sentenced last August by a Russian court to nine years in prison for carrying less than a gram of hash oil into Russia when she arrived in February of this year for play in the Russian women’s professional basketball league. She transferred to a prison colony in Mordovia, 300 miles southeast of Moscow, last month.
Former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan was detained in Moscow in 2018 on espionage charges, found guilty in a closed trial and is now nearly three years into a 16-year prison sentence. He denies the accusations, and U.S. officials have denounced his trial as unfair.
At the end of November, 52-year-old Whelan was briefly transferred from a penal colony to a prison hospital. The White House had been concerned about his condition and whereabouts, after he spoke to his family last Friday.
David said that his brother was as good as he could be in a Russian labor camp. “They don’t provide nutrition, and they don’t take care of prisoners.” There is a lot of corruption. I think he tries to stay out of people’s way.
Biden stressed that efforts to secure Whelan’s release are ongoing, and said his administration is in close touch with Whelan’s family (the U.S. official said Biden intends to speak with them too).
They said in a statement that U.S. officials had let them know a day in advance that Whelan would be “left behind” in the prisoner swap, adding that was not the case in April, when 30-year-old former U.S. Marine Trevor Reed was released in exchange for jailed pilot Konstantin Yaroshenko.
“That early warning meant that our family has been able to mentally prepare for what is now a public disappointment for us,” David Whelan told the Detroit News. “And a catastrophe for Paul. I do not know if he is aware yet, although he will surely learn from Russian media. Our parents have been keeping in touch with him every day since he came back to IK 17, and they will definitely speak to him soon.
Despite the disappointment, Whelan’s brother said he is happy for Griner and her loved ones, adding that “there is no greater success than for a wrongful detainee to be freed and for them to go home.”
Jonathan Franks, a spokesperson for the Bring Our Families Home Campaign, said in a statement that while “we celebrate Brittney’s homecoming, our hearts break for the Whelan family.”
“Paul Whelan has been let down and left behind at least three times by 2 Presidents,” he added. “He deserves better from his government and our campaign implores President Biden to immediately get Paul back in front of them,” it said.