Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Tuesday that Russia and the White House have agreed to a prisoner swap, according to NBC News.
Lavrov did not provide any additional details as to the nature or persons involved in the swap in his remarks during multilateral negotiations involving Russia, Turkey, the U.S. and Ukraine in Istanbul, Turkey, according to NBC News. The deal would be the second such swap in as many months, as Russian-American woman Ksenia Karelina was released in April after being imprisoned on treason charges in exchange for Russian national Arthur Petrov.
The exchange comes in the backdrop of stalled negotiations between the U.S., Ukraine and Russia to end the three-year war. In light of the slow-moving talks, President Donald Trump has reportedly become frustrated with Putin, and has considered implementing new sanctions against Moscow, a number of unnamed sources told The Wall Street Journal Tuesday.
“President Trump is a man who wants results,” Lavrov said in his remarks, according to NBC News.
Other recent high-profile prison swaps between Washington and Moscow include the return of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich to the U.S., along with former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan and British activist Vladimir Kara-Murza in 2024. The deal was highly complex, involving 26 people from seven countries.
Most recently in Turkey, Russia and Ukraine agreed to the largest prisoner swap of the war, each handing over 1,000 prisoners while Kiev and Moscow both promised to draft ceasefire proposals for future negotiations.
However, the war has yet to reach any foreseeable end, as Putin continues to bombard Ukraine while slowly advancing troops into contested ground.
A State Department spokesperson declined to get into the details of “private diplomatic conversations,” but noted that the department has “made it a priority to bring home Americans unjustly detained overseas.”
The Russian Foreign Ministry did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
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