The White House is preparing a new proposal to Russia for the release of two American nationals it is detaining, a spokesperson said Thursday.
“We are working hard to see if we can come up with another proposal that would be more successful,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said after Moscow rejected a previous offer to free the journalist from Wall Street Journal Evan Gershkovich and former Marine Paul Whelan.
Paul Whelan, imprisoned for espionage in Russia since 2018, feels “abandoned” by the United States, which he accuses of “treason” for failing to repatriate him, in an interview published Wednesday by the BBC.
The inmate spends his days sewing clothes and hats in a prison factory. He said it was -15 degrees inside the prison, where he said he was recently attacked by a fellow inmate.
John Kirby called reports that the former soldier was “physically threatened” “very disturbing.”
Evan Gershkovich, 32-year-old American journalist from Wall Street Journal having also worked for the AFP in Moscow in the past, was arrested by Russian security services during a report in Yekaterinburg, in the Urals, on March 29, 2023.
The reporter is accused of espionage, a crime punishable by 20 years in prison, but he rejects these accusations, as do Washington, his newspaper, his friends and his family.
Russia has refused all offers made by the United States so far for the release of the two Americans, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said a week ago, calling on President Vladimir Putin to “ negotiate in good faith.
“We made multiple offers. There is a substantial offer that we made a few weeks ago,” the spokesperson noted to the press, stressing that Moscow had “rejected” them all.
He thus responded to the Russian president’s statements saying he “hoped” for an agreement with Washington on this subject.
Americans and Russians have carried out several prisoner exchanges in the past.
A year ago, the United States notably obtained the release of Brittney Griner, an American basketball star detained in Russia, in exchange for that of Viktor Bout, a Russian arms dealer of international stature.
