Multilateral prisoner exchange negotiations were underway when Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny died last month, CNN has reported quoting several sources.
The negotiations involved Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, as well as former US secretary of state Hillary Clinton in the early stages. Abramovich has been sanctioned in the West and mostly lives in the United Arab Emirates.
Abramovich was in contact with the US and European officials, and he also maintained contacts in the Kremlin following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
CNN quoted the sources as claiming that Abramovich even went to Moscow to secure the prisoner exchange deal, and he met Russian leader Vladimir Putin just hours before prison authorities declared Navalny dead.
‘Informal negotiator’
According to Maria Pevchikh, a close aide to Navalny, Abramovich had become involved in exploring a deal and had “delivered the proposal to swap Navalny” to the Kremlin. She also claimed that he was acting as “an informal negotiator in communication with American and European officials.”
Watch: Hundreds bid farewell to Alexei Navalny at his funeral
The source said Abramovich was left shocked and ‘flabbergasted’ when he heard the news of Navalny’s death. It is to be noted that the Russian authorities have been evading questions about such a prisoner exchange programme.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov had side-stepped questions about Abramovich’s involvement on February 27, just 11 days after Navalny’s death, saying, “You can ask Abramovich’s representatives. This is not a question to us.”
But a US official quoted by CNN said no such formal offer was extended to the Kremlin when Navalny died. “There was no formal offer extended to Russia at the time of Navalny’s death,” the source said.
Hillary Clinton’s involvement
CNN reported that Christo Grozev, who has worked with the Navalny team for several years, approached Hillary Clinton in the summer of 2022. Clinton reportedly agreed to the idea of exchanging Navalny ‘for a Russian linked to the security service, the FSB, who had been convicted of murder in Berlin’.
Clinton also passed on the message to US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan.
However, it was unclear whether a final framework of the deal was hammered out.
(With inputs from agencies)
