Russian and U.S. officials held a fresh round of talks in Turkey, after a prisoner swap in which Moscow released detained American Ksenia Karelina.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a post on the X platform Thursday that Karelina was “on a plane back home” after President Donald Trump had secured her release.
Karelina was exchanged for Russian citizen Arthur Petrov in a swap conducted at Abu Dhabi international airport through the mediation of the United Arab Emirates, Russia’s Federal Security Service said Thursday, according to the state-run Tass news service.
Karelina, a dual U.S.-Russian citizen who was a resident of Los Angeles, was sentenced to 12 years for treason in August of last year over a donation she had made to a charity that helps Ukraine. She was detained during a family visit to the Urals city of Yekaterinburg.
Trump told reporters at the White House that his administration asked Russian President Vladimir Putin to release Karelina at the request of Dana White, the owner of Ultimate Fighting Championship, who’s a friend and supporter of the president. Trump said Karelina, who he described as a ballet dancer, knows one of White’s fighters.
Petrov is a dual Russian-German citizen who was detained in 2023 in Cyprus on a U.S. request for allegedly exporting dual-use electronics, according to The Wall Street Journal, which reported the prisoner exchange earlier Thursday.
CIA’s Role
CIA Director John Ratcliffe negotiated the swap with his Russian counterpart and was at Abu Dhabi airport to greet Karelina.
“Much of the swap was negotiated by the U.S. government, with CIA playing a key role engaging with Russian intelligence,” the Central Intelligence Agency said in a statement. Without referring directly to tensions over Russia’s continuing invasion of Ukraine, the agency said that the prisoner exchange “shows the importance of keeping lines of communication open with Russia, despite the deep challenges in our bilateral relationship.”
The U.S.-Russia talks taking place in Istanbul focused on restoring the two countries’ diplomatic missions, as well as direct flights that Washington suspended after Russia’s February 2022 invasion, Russian Ambassador to the United States Alexander Darchiyev told state news service RIA Novosti. The war in Ukraine wasn’t on the agenda, State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce told reporters Tuesday.
“The U.S. and Russian delegations exchanged notes to finalize an understanding to ensure the stability of diplomatic banking for Russian and U.S. bilateral missions,” the U.S. State Department said in a statement. “The United States reiterated its concerns about the Russian Federation’s policy prohibiting the employment of local staff, which is the key impediment” to “stable and sustainable staffing levels at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. “
Russian officials stressed the need for “the speedy return” of Russian diplomatic property confiscated by the U.S., Darchiyev said, according to Tass. The two sides agreed on measures to ease the movement of their diplomats in each other’s countries, he said.
The meeting came after Putin’s representative, Kirill Dmitriev, returned from two days of consultations in the United States last week and signaled there would be new talks. Dmitriev met with Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and Rubio in Washington, days after the U.S. president expressed frustration with Putin over a lack of progress in achieving a ceasefire in Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Darchiyev is leading Moscow’s delegation in the Istanbul talks, while U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Sonata Coulter heads the negotiators from Washington, according to the State Department.
The release of Karelina is the second swap of detainees since Trump became president in January. Russia freed U.S. teacher Marc Fogel in February during a visit to Moscow by Witkoff, who met Putin for several hours.
Putin and Trump have held two publicly announced phone calls since the U.S. president took office, kicking off a rapprochement between Washington and Moscow after contacts were all but cut off following the start of the war.
U.S. and Russian representatives previously discussed restoring embassy operations during a meeting at the U.S. Consul General’s residence in Istanbul on Feb. 27, after which Putin said the renewed contacts with Trump’s administration “give us some hope.”
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