Ahmad 
In what appeared to be the largest prisoner swap between Russia and the United States since the end of the Cold War in the 1980s, Turkey witnessed a process described as massive, involving several countries such as Germany, the United Kingdom, Slovenia and Belarus.
The deal freed the “Wall Street Journal” correspondent in Moscow, Ivan Gershkovich, and former US Marine Paul Whelan.
The deal also includes the release of Russian-American ballerina Ksenia Karlina and Russian-British activist Vladimir Kara-Murza.
The Turkish presidency said that 10 prisoners, including two minors, were transferred to Russia. Thirteen prisoners were transferred to Germany and three to the United States. Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization announced that it was coordinating a major prisoner swap between Russia and Belarus on the one hand, and the United States and Germany on the other.
It added in a statement: “Our agency played a major role in mediating this exchange, which is the largest in recent times.”
Reuters reported that the flight tracking website Flightradar24 showed that a private Russian government plane used in a previous prisoner swap involving the United States and Russia had flown from Moscow to the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, which borders Lithuania and Poland, before heading back to Moscow.
The Russian news agency RIA reported that four Russians imprisoned in the United States had disappeared from a prisoner database run by the US Federal Bureau of Prisons. It identified them as Vinnik, Maxim Marchenko, Vadim Konoshenok and Vladislav Klyushin.
At least two other Russians, Vladimir Dunayev and Roman Seleznev, who are accused of cybercrimes, are also being held in the United States and may have been involved.
The Kremlin declined to say whether a swap was imminent, and the Russian embassy in Washington declined to comment. There was no immediate comment from Western countries. Such swaps are usually shrouded in secrecy until they happen.
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