Dylan Bettencourt
American President Joe Biden has offered a convicted Russian arms dealer in exchange for two detainees, including women’s basketball star Brittney Griner.
The other detainee, Paul Whelan was arrested in Moscow in December 2018 and convicted of being an American spy and handed a 16-year prison sentence.
The United States Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said the Biden administration made a “substantial offer” to bring the two American detainees home.
Moscow is also said to be interested in the deal that would see arms trafficker Viktor Bout return to his home country.
The arms dealer, labelled the Merchant of Death, is serving a 25-year prison sentence in America. He was charged after he attempted to sell weapons to a Colombian rebel group to use against Americans.
Bout sold and transported weapons into a number of African conflicts.
The women’s basketball star Griner was detained in Russia after being found with vape cartridges in her luggage earlier this year.
She was taken into custody in February with cannabis oil found while she was on her way back to America after playing in Russia.
Following Griner’s drug possession trial on Wednesday, she said she was made to sign documents that “no-one explained” to her.
The 31-year-old added that she did not receive an explanation of her rights nor access to a lawyer for several hours following her detention.
Griner explained that she was made to use a translator electronic app to communicate with the Russian authorities.
The Olympic gold medalist pleaded guilty to the drug charges but claimed she did not deliberately break the law explaining that she had packed her bag in a hurry.
“I still don’t understand to this day how the vape cartridges ended up in my bags,” Griner said, told the BBC.
“With them being accidentally in my bags, I take responsibility, but I did not intend to smuggle or plan to smuggle anything into Russia.”
Her trial is set to continue in August with her detention extended to December.
White House spokesman John Kirby said the trade offer was made several weeks ago but explained that Russia “hasn’t favourably engaged so far.”
The US added that it considers both Griner and Whelan to have been wrongfully detained by Russia.
Image source: @CNN
