DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Palus Politicus Brittney Griner has been freed

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Updated 4 minutes ago

WNBA star Brittney Griner released from Russian custody in a high-profile prisoner swap between the U.S. and Moscow

Dec. 8, 2022, 8:06 AM EST / Updated Dec. 8, 2022, 8:22 AM EST
By Andrea Mitchell, Zoë Richards and Yuliya Talmazan
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WASHINGTON — WNBA star Brittney Griner is free Thursday after the Biden administration negotiated her release from a Russian penal colony in exchange for an arms dealer, according to a senior administration official.

President Joe Biden signed off on the trade, which took place in the United Arab Emirates, even though it meant leaving behind Paul Whelan, an American corporate security executive who remains jailed in Russia.

Brittney Griner's wife, Cherelle Griner, was in the Oval Office with Biden and the two were able to speak with her by phone, according to a senior White House official.

Biden is expected to give remarks at 8:45 a.m. ET.

The move marks one of the most high-profile prisoner swaps between Moscow and Washington since the Cold War, with the Kremlin seeing the return of Viktor Bout, who Russian President Vladimir Putin has been wanting to get back — and who had served 11 years of a 25-year sentence in the United States.



Griner’s return to the United States will cap a monthslong saga that began in February when she was detained at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport after Russian authorities said they found vape canisters with cannabis oil in her luggage. She was later jailed on drug charges.

The 32-year-old Phoenix Mercury player was the subject of prolonged and often public negotiations between the two countries after a trial that underscored frayed relations amid Russia’s war in Ukraine. Biden's administration had sought the release of both Griner and Whelan.[social:tweet]President Biden
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Moments ago I spoke to Brittney Griner.

She is safe.
She is on a plane.
She is on her way home.
8:14 AM · Dec 8, 2022
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“I’m telling you, I am determined to get her home and get her home safely — along with others, I might add,” Biden said of the situation on Nov. 9.

CBS first reported Griner's release.

Whelan is serving a 16-year prison sentence after being accused of spying, which the U.S. has denied. People familiar with the negotiations for his release say the Russians refused to release Whelan without getting a Russian spy in return. The U.S. insists it does not have any Russian spies in its custody, and thus no one to trade to meet the Kremlin’s demand.

Griner’s release marks a stunning turn of events from last month, when she began serving a nine-year sentence at a Russian penal colony more than 200 miles east of Moscow.

During her trial in July, Griner pleaded guilty but said she had no criminal intent. Griner said the canisters, which she had been prescribed to treat chronic pain, were packed inadvertently as she hurriedly prepared for her flight.

As her trial neared its end in early August, it became public that the U.S. put a prisoner swap offer on the table for Moscow to consider. Russia called for “quiet diplomacy” but said after her sentencing that it was ready to discuss a deal.

NBC News reported in July that the U.S. proposed a prisoner exchange with Russia for the release of Griner and Whelan, who has been detained since 2018. That deal, two sources familiar with the matter confirmed at the time, would have included the U.S. releasing Bout, known as the "Merchant of Death" because he was considered one of the world’s largest illicit arms dealers.

Bout was sentenced to 25 years in federal prison in 2012 after he was convicted of selling arms to Colombian rebels, which prosecutors said were intended to kill Americans. The Kremlin has been demanding his release over the past decade, saying he was unfairly targeted.

The Washington-Moscow swap marks the most prominent diplomatic engagement between the two countries since the U.S. and its allies firmly backed Kyiv and condemned the Kremlin for launching the war against its neighbor in February.

The Biden administration has faced tremendous pressure to help bring home the 6-foot-9 Houston native. Griner’s teammates, family and friends, as well as a number of U.S. celebrities lobbied for her return.

Griner’s release is the second publicly known U.S. prisoner swap with Russia since the war in Ukraine started. American Trevor Reed was released in April after spending nearly three years in a Russian jail. The former Marine was freed in a prisoner exchange that saw Biden commute the sentence of Konstantin Yaroshenko, a convicted Russian drug trafficker serving time in Connecticut who was sentenced to 20 years in prison in the U.S. in 2010.

With the United States and its Western allies confronting the realities of a new Cold War with Russia in the wake of the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine, the high-stakes swap will evoke memories of Soviet-era trades involving spies.

One of the most well known Cold War swaps involved American pilot Francis Gary Powers, whose U-2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union. He was traded in 1962 for Soviet spy Rudolf Abel in an exchange on a fog-shrouded bridge between West Berlin and East Germany.

The largest U.S.-Russian spy swap since the Cold War came in 2010 when 10 Russian agents, including Anna Chapman, were exchanged for four other Russians accused of spying for the West — among them Sergei Skripal, who was later poisoned with a nerve agent in the United Kingdom. The British government blamed Moscow for the poisoning.

So, the woman who refused to stand for the National Anthem is being exchanged for the "Merchant of Death." What a bunch of BS!!!

Here is some information on Viktor Bout:



Viktor Bout: Who is the Merchant of Death
Published
20 minutes ago


Viktor Bout spent more than two years in a Bangkok jail.
Viktor Bout, one of the world's most infamous arms dealers, has been released from US custody as part of a prisoner exchange with US basketball star Brittney Griner.

Griner had been in custody since February after Moscow airport officials found cannabis oil in her luggage while she was returning to the US after playing in Russia.

Rumours had circulated in US media for months that senior state department officials had sought to secure Griner's release in exchange for the arms dealer's freedom.

So notorious are the exploits of the former Soviet air force officer that they inspired a Hollywood film, and garnered him an impressively fearsome nickname.



But who is the man known as the Merchant of Death?

Short presentational grey line
Bout was extradited from Thailand to the US in 2010, after a sting operation by the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) two years earlier.

Agents from the DEA posed as potential buyers from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as Farc. That group - which has since disbanded - was classified as a terrorist organisation by the United States.

Bout claimed he was simply an entrepreneur with a legitimate international transport business, wrongly accused of trying to arm South American rebels - the victims of US political machinations.

But a jury in New York didn't believe his story.

He was sentenced to 25 years in prison in April 2012 after being found guilty of conspiracy to kill Americans and US officials, delivering anti-aircraft missiles and aiding a terrorist organisation.

His three-week trial heard that Bout had been told the weapons would be used to kill US pilots working with Colombian officials. Prosecutors said he replied: "We have the same enemy."

Bout - a Russian national born in Soviet-ruled Tajikistan - began his career in air transport in the early 1990s, after the fall of the USSR.

According to a 2007 book - Merchant of Death, by security experts Douglas Farah and Stephen Braun - Bout built up his business using military planes left on the airfields of the collapsing Soviet empire in the early 1990s.


Bout was extradited from Thailand to the US after efforts by Russian diplomats to have him released failed.
The sturdy Antonovs and Ilyushins were up for sale along with their crews, and were perfect for delivering goods to bumpy wartime airstrips around the world.

Bout - who was 45 when he was sentenced - is said to have begun channelling weapons through a series of front companies to war-torn parts of Africa.

The UN named him as an associate of former Liberian President Charles Taylor - who was convicted in 2012 on charges of aiding and abetting war crimes during the Sierra Leone civil war.

"[Bout is a] businessman, dealer and transporter of weapons and minerals [who] supported former President Taylor's regime in [an] effort to destabilise Sierra Leone and gain illicit access to diamonds," UN documents state.

Media reports in the Middle East claimed he was a gun-runner for al-Qaeda and the Taliban.

He is also alleged to have armed both sides in Angola's civil war and supplied weapons to warlords and governments from the Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo to Sudan and Libya.

Short presentational grey line
In an interview with the UK's Channel 4 News in 2009, he flatly denied ever dealing with al-Qaeda or the Taliban.

But he did admit to flying arms to Afghanistan in the mid-1990s, saying they were used by commanders fighting against the Taliban.

He also claimed to have helped the French government transport goods to Rwanda after the genocide, and to have transported UN peacekeepers.

But law enforcement agencies pursued him throughout the 2000s. He left his home in Belgium in 2002 when the authorities there issued an arrest warrant.

It is thought Bout travelled under several aliases, moving through countries such as the United Arab Emirates and South Africa before resurfacing in Russia in 2003.

In the same year, British Foreign Office minister Peter Hain coined the nickname Merchant of Death

After reading a 2003 report about him, Mr Hain said: "Bout is the leading merchant of death who is the principal conduit for planes and supply routes that take arms... from East Europe, principally Bulgaria, Moldova and Ukraine to Liberia and Angola.

"The UN has exposed Bout as the centre of a spider's web of shady arms dealers, diamond brokers and other operatives, sustaining the wars."


Russian authorities have called for Mr. Bout’s return since his 2011 conviction.
The US made moves against Bout throughout the 2000s, freezing his assets in 2006, but there was no law he could be prosecuted under in the US.

Instead, US agents bided their time until 2008 when they posed as buyers for Colombia's Farc rebels and gained an introduction to Bout through one of his former associates.

Shortly after the undercover officers discussed arms shipments to Farc with Bout, Thai authorities arrested him and lengthy legal proceedings began to bring him to the US.

Bout said the US case against him was politically motivated; his wife has been quoted as saying his only connection with Colombia was "tango lessons".

The Russian authorities supported him throughout his legal proceedings, with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov vowing to fight to secure his return to Russia and labelling the Thai court's decision "unjust and political".

The 2005 film Lord of War, loosely based on the arms dealer's life, has the anti-hero escaping justice at the end.

But such an ending eluded Bout, who had remained in prison in the US since his conviction in 2012.


https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-11036569

I'm surprised you resorted to a personal insult. Pfffttttt

I don't support freeing a man who has played a huge role in killing thousands of Americans and also thousands of other human beings across the globe. I feel sorry for his victims. You don't like that.............Tough!

This post I am making is mostly for me to be educated on some things.

What is the penalty in the US for possession of marijuana?
How many people do we have locked up for possession?

Seems odd to me that we would trade a guy like the "Merchant of Death" to get someone released for doing something that would put her in jail in our country too. Except it doesn't seem odd because she is a celebrity athlete.

j/c:

Optics of this look pretty bad.

They are. And while I'm not going to use some lams ass excuse like "She didn't kneel for the National Anthem", there's no way I think they should have traded The Merchant of Death for a woman that claims she's too stupid to know what was in her suitcase.

I'm glad she's free. Just like with any American imprisoned overseas I would like to see them returned home. But the deal they made to secure her release stinks to high heaven.

FREED WITH A MARINE LEFT BEHIND AND FOR A RUSSIAN THUG!

Great job Biden! "You" (Chinese Regime) continue to FAIL the USA!

I agree. I wonder how the Marines feel right now with one of their brothers still behind bars.
Trading her for a high level arms dealer is a friggen joke.

I am glad she is free, but this is a [censored] joke.

I'm glad she is free, as well. However, this is a travesty of outrageous proportions. We are freeing a man so he can profit from the deaths of Americans other innocent citizens across the world? WTF?!?

I understand this is not the political forum, but make no mistake, this is a political topic. Our government just got abused by Putin. Celebrities and social justice warriors are cheering this move, but in my mind, this is a criminal act by our government.

I would like to ask you, since the Biden administration negotiated a prisoner swap a former Marine Trevor Reed in April, is it your contention that now they would not have made such a swap for Whelan had that been possible? Or is that just a conclusion you are jumping to because that's the way you think?

It may not meet a legal test, but you bet it is. This is sickening.

What crime is it that was committed? I too think the swap was ridiculous and one sided. I think Biden got hoodwinked. But exactly what crime do you think they're guilty of?

I think it was more a figure of speech. I wouldn't get too hung up on that.

This guy is a weapons dealer. He knows where to find the weapons, and Russia is using up a lot of weapons and might have a real need to have that guy.

The guy is a disgusting piece of scum responsible for countless deaths and should never have been used as a bargaining chip for someone who claims to be so stupid she didn't know she had weed in her luggage. I think in principal we totally agree with that. But I would appreciate you help me understand what you mean by this........


I asked you before because I'm not quite clear on what you are asserting.

The first WNBA trade to ever make headline news.

I have the exact same thoughts... glad she's not locked up in a Russian prison... the deal we made is awful.... and we need to be doing more to get Paul Whelan out....

j/c...

Tough situation all around. The previous administration failed to bring Whelan home and the current administration has failed to this point as well.

From the Whelan family...

They are demonstrating a level of class that would be difficult for me.

If a family member of mine were in this same situation, I'm not certain that I'd be able to exercise such diplomacy.

If we had gotten Whelen out -- I'm guessing there would have been a lot of people on here arguing "why did we trade the Merchant of Death for a Canadian/British/Irish citizen with a bad conduct discharge."

Are you making a point? Or, are you simply criticizing who questions your preferred party? That's why this forum sucks. People don't look at both sides objectively. It's either all good or all bad. For the record, I would not release a man who has a hand in murdering so many Americans and other innocent people across the globe. I'll leave the thread and you can continue to deflect by focusing the attention on others.

This is an example of how the Russians operate..they leverage every deal they make to the max in an effort to portray power.

They know how to push the buttons of the American people, pitting Americans against Americans, attempting to divide Americans...and it works.

Putin had Griner arrested on bogus charges so he could use her as leverage. Putin knew Griner was a popular athlete and her arrest would strike a nerve and make a prisoner swap for Victor more possible. The Russians are not always dumb.

For the USA, the goal is to get as many of our people who are held in Russia..back home. But the Russians were not going to move off of the trade that they proposed. Obviously, they value Whalen more than Griner and were willing to let her go in a one of one swap. No way to know how long this deal has been in the works but make no mistake about it, the USA wanted both Whalen and Griner in trade for Victor...but that deal was not going to happen. The USA took the deal they could get, knowing they can still work to get Whalen back in the future.

What some fail to understand is that out of the public eye, back-channel talks go on constantly. Whalen has not been forgotten and unofficial negotiations will continue in an effort to get him home too.

Also, let's not pretend that Victor has not had to pay a price for his conduct as an arms dealer. He has been locked up since March 2008, when he was arrested in a US sting operation...15 yrs in jail does not translate into letting him go, scot-free.

I think that is exactly what Lyuokdea was doing.

Putin didn't put marijuana in Griner's bag. The penalty may be considered bogus or extreme, but the charges are anything but.

As to the second part I bolded above, the 'narrative' changed quickly from the initial reports. NBC quickly scrubbed the web and amended their reports on TV. Nobody else in the media dared to ask questions, because... well, you know.


So apparently there was a choice, according to a senior WH official... but then, that didn't align with the lie Joe told in his address, so everything changed.

It appears to me, and from what has been reported, that the White House has and is staying in close contact with them regarding the exchange of dialogue between Russia and the U.S. And as such they are fully aware of everything the Biden administration is doing to try and bring their son home. As such it seems they were fully aware that there was no opportunity to strike a deal with Russia to bring their son home at the present time.

So you have made the decision that an unnamed White House source is telling the truth and Biden lied? Well alrighty then.

So when does the media tour start that makes her out to be an American hero?

America has forgotten what real heroes are. Now anyone who picks up litter along side the road some will call a hero. She's certainly no hero but much like yourself I'm expecting be hearing it from some.

I'd say you can go ahead and pencil her in for BSPN's Arthur Ashe Courage Award. Because leaving her off the ballot would cause outrage, and her not winning when nominated would not be good for ratings.

‘A Nation That Spits on Its Heroes’: Russian Media Laughs at Our Wokeness in Swapping for Brittney Griner and Leaving Paul Whelan to Rot
By J.D. Rucker • Dec. 9, 2022

Yesterday’s announcement of the prisoner swap between Russia and the United States that sent WNBA star Brittney Griner home in exchange for Viktor Bout, known as the “Merchant of Death, prompted both applause and criticism for the Biden-Harris regime. But the biggest concern is that alleged “spy” Paul Whelan continues to rot.

According to CNN:

Griner was released in a prisoner swap that involved Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout. The exchange, however, did not include another American that the State Department has declared wrongfully detained, Paul Whelan.

“She’s safe, she’s on a plane, she’s on her way home,” Biden said at the White House Thursday morning alongside Griner’s wife, Cherelle. “After months of being unjustly detained in Russia, held under untolerable circumstances, Brittney will soon be back in the arms of her loved ones, and she should have been there all along.”

Biden acknowledged that Griner’s release was occurring while Whelan remained imprisoned, saying that Whelan’s family “have to have such mixed emotions today.”

Russian media has some ideas about why this happened. Paul Whelan is a “national hero” who was allegedly working for his country. He is also a White heterosexual male who isn’t a drug addict while Griner is a Black homosexual female who couldn’t travel go a day without her THC. And they’re laughing at us over it. Watch:



https://thelibertydaily.com/russian...y-griner-and-leaving-paul-whelan-to-rot/

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