I don’t know anything about the Navalny exchange negotiations – Kommersant

Russian Presidential Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov told the newspaper Financial Times, that he has no information about any negotiations that were allegedly conducted with the aim of exchanging Alexei Navalny. The Western press and the politician’s associates claim that he could be exchanged for Russian Vadim Krasikov, convicted in Germany for the murder of a Chechen militant.

“I am not aware of such agreements,” said Dmitry Peskov. The FT article, citing an anonymous source, reports that in recent weeks, negotiations have been held to exchange Vadim Krasikov for Alexei Navalny and two US citizens: Evan Gershkovich (arrested on suspicion of espionage) and Paul Whelan (convicted of espionage). However, after the death of the oppositionist, the FT source said, interest in such negotiations among Western diplomats has weakened.

Russian Vadim Krasikov was sentenced in Germany to life imprisonment in 2021 on charges of murdering Georgian citizen Zelimkhan Khangoshvili. In December 2019, President Vladimir Putin called Zelimkhan Khangoshvili a person who “took part in hostilities, a separatist” and one of the organizers of the terrorist attack in the Moscow metro.

In a recent interview with American journalist Tucker Carlson, Mr. Putin saidthat an exchange of Evan Gershkovich is possible if the United States agrees. He reported on the discussion of this issue through the special services. In this context, the president recalled that in Germany “there is a man who, for patriotic reasons, eliminated a bandit in one of the European capitals.”

Foreign representatives of the oppositionist earlier today, February 26, issued a statement that negotiations on the exchange of Alexei Navalny to the West were at the final stage. Newspaper New York Times with reference to American officials, writes that Germany asked to include Alexei Navalny in any deal for the release of Vadim Krasikov. Newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung Citing sources in Western government circles, she reported that negotiations between Berlin and Moscow on the exchange of Alexei Navalny for Vadim Krasikov “have advanced far.”

About the death of Alexei Navalny in the colony – in the material of Kommersant “The FSIN is authorized to declare”.