Happily, this is a “Hostage Sunday” to celebrate. Three of our American hostages — Evan Gershkovich, Alsu Kurmasheva, and Paul Whelan — as well as dual British-Russian citizen Vladimir Kara-Murza, have been released and are safely back in the land of the free.

In addition, the complex, multi-nation exchange included the release of twelve Russian and German political prisoners . . . all of whom were immediately deported and flown to Germany, where the Russian members of the group await uncertain futures. Some, understandably, have said they had hoped to remain in their homeland with their families and friends, despite the obvious dangers.

But the Russian government had other ideas, which did not include housing “traitors,” as they called them. The twelve now in Germany are:

Lilia Chanysheva
Ksenia Fadeyeva
Oleg Orlov
Ilya Yashin
Kevin Lik
Rico Krieger
Dieter Voronin
Patrick Schobel
German Moyzhes
Vadim Ostanin
Andrei Pivovarov
Aleksandra Skochilenko

Three of the most vocal dissidents — Vladimir Kara-Murza, Ilya Yashin and Andrei Pivovarov — have already expressed their intention to continue fighting the Putin regime until the Russian people are able to live in a free and peaceful society . . . even though they will probably have to work from outside the country. No surprise there, and best of luck to them.

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But while we were able to free a total of sixteen wrongfully-detained political prisoners, there remain hundreds of others throughout Russia’s prison system . . . including eight additional American citizens. And they must not be forgotten.

So who are these eight people still locked away, who now comprise our much-reduced HOSTAGE list?

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Marc Fogel, a schoolteacher from Pennsylvania, was arrested in August of 2021 for possession of 0.6 ounce of legally-prescribed (in the U.S.) medical marijuana. In June of 2022 he was sentenced to 14 years in prison.

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Robert Romanov Woodland, a dual US-Russian citizen, was teaching English in Russia when he was arrested in January of 2024 for allegedly attempting to sell drugs. In July, he was sentenced to 12-1/2 years in a maximum security prison.

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U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Gordon Black was stationed in South Korea when he fell into a Russian “honey trap.” He was on his way back to his home in Texas, on two weeks’ leave, when he was lured to Vladivostok by the Russian girlfriend he had met in Korea. He was arrested in May of 2024 on charges of alleged larceny and murder threat, and sentenced the following month to a prison term of three years and nine months.

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Robert Gilman, already in jail in Russia serving a 4-1/2-year sentence (later reduced to 3-1/2 years on appeal) for kicking a police officer in 2022, found himself facing added charges in 2023 of punching prison staff in the head, and later also attacking a criminal investigator and another prison guard.

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Ksenia Karelina is a dual US-Russian citizen. A resident of Los Angeles, she was visiting family in Yekaterinburg, Russia, in February of this year, when she was arrested for treason . . . for having donated $50 — while in the United States — to a charity that offered assistance to Ukrainian war victims.

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David Barnes, an American citizen and resident of Texas, was arrested in January of 2022 while visiting his children, who had been taken to Russia from Texas by his Russian wife. He was charged and sentenced in the fall of that year to 21 years in prison for child abuse (allegedly occurring while in Texas), on his wife’s accusation. I really wish I knew more of this story!

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Eugene Spector, a dual US-Russian citizen already serving a four-year sentence handed down in June of 2021 on a bribery conviction, received additional charges of suspicion of espionage in August of 2023. No other details have been found, as the evidence is labelled “classified.”

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Michael Travis Leake, a rock musician and former paratrooper, was sentenced in July of this year to 13 years in prison on drug charges — specifically, suspicion of selling mephedrone, and organizing a drug trafficking business “involving young people.”

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Are any of these prisoners actually guilty of the charges leveled against them? I don’t know. But I do know that the recent timing of a number of the arrests, and the speed with which they were brought to trial, is a clear indication of Russia’s intentional roundup of American citizens to be used as (what I call) Putin’s Pawns.

What they are, quite simply, are HOSTAGES. And they will not — MUST not — be forgotten. Let’s shorten this list to zero.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
8/4/24