Brittney Griner Is Freed as Part of a Prisoner Swap With Russia

That set in movement a set of extremely choreographed actions in each Russia and the US, all finished with strict secrecy.

Two days in the past, Russians moved Ms. Griner from the penal colony to Moscow, in preparation for a attainable swap, based on a senior White Home official. On Thursday morning, Russians put Ms. Griner on a aircraft and flew her to an airport within the United Arab Emirates, whose authorities had agreed to function the situation for the swap.

In a video posted by the Russian state information company RIA Novosti, Ms. Griner is proven boarding a aircraft within the snow with two duffel baggage. As soon as aboard and in her seat, she is requested by an unidentified particular person, “What’s your temper?”

She replies, “Completely satisfied.”

Late on Wednesday afternoon, American officers put Mr. Bout on a aircraft headed to the U.A.E. One other video launched by Russia’s state media exhibits the second of the swap. Ms. Griner, sporting a pink jacket and trousers, walks with three males in fits towards one other man and Mr. Bout, who’s clutching a brown envelope and holding a coat over one arm.

One man shakes Mr. Bout’s hand and embraces him, after which a second man additionally shakes his hand. Ms. Griner then veers off towards one other group of males, together with what seems to be an U.A.E. official clad in flowing robes, as they shake her hand.

As soon as American officers confirmed that Ms. Griner was able to return to the US, the president signed a conditional grant of clemency to Mr. Bout, who was captured in Bangkok in 2008, extradited to the US in 2010 and sentenced in 2012 to 25 years in jail.

Across the time that Mr. Bout took off, the administration despatched an official to Chappaquiddick, Mass., to let Elizabeth Whalen, his sister, know what was about to occur, a step they didn’t take when the federal government agreed to the same swap in April for Trevor Reed, an ailing U.S. Marine veteran held for 2 years on what his household thought of to be bogus prices of assault.