Vladimir Putin
Shot dead officer in Berlin - now the torpedo is welcomed home by Putin
Noam Bertling
Published 00.31
Five years ago, he shot and killed an officer in a park in Berlin in broad daylight.
Two years later he was sentenced to life imprisonment.
Today the torpedo was welcomed home - by Vladimir Putin.
Quick version
There has been a historic prisoner exchange between a number of Western countries and Russia.
26 prisoners have been exchanged between the USA, Russia, Norway, Poland, Germany, Slovenia and Belarus.
Among the most notable are a Russian torpedo, a pair of spies and a hacker.
Shot dead officer
Former FSB colonel Vadim Krasikov, 58, has been one of the top priorities for Moscow to bring home, according to CNN.
Krasikov was sentenced in 2021 to life imprisonment in Germany after shooting dead Chechen-Georgian officer Zelimkhan “Tornike” Khangoshvili in Berlin in the middle of the day in a park.
The murder took place in 2019 and is described by the court as an "execution".
The murder victim fought for Georgia when Russia invaded the country in 2008 and was considered a terrorist by Russia. He was also a platoon commander during the second Chechen war that broke out in 1999.
According to the German court, Krasikov murdered for the Russian state.
As late as 2022, Moscow tried to get the torpedo home. Then it was in connection with the prisoner exchange of WNBA player Brittney Griner and Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout.
In the same negotiation, the US tried to bring home Marine Paul Whelan in exchange for Krasikov. That exchange did not go smoothly and both continued to be imprisoned until now.
Confessed espionage
Two other Russian citizens who were allowed to return home were the spy couple Artem Dultsev and Anna Dultseva.
They spied together for Russia in Slovenia.
Artem Dultsev lived under the alter ego Ludvig Gish, an IT businessman.
This week he admitted his crime and was sentenced to a year and a half in prison by the court in Ljubljana. The sentence included deportation to Russia and a five-year entry ban.
Anna Dultseva pleaded guilty to espionage on the same day as her husband and received the same sentence. Her alter ego, Maria Rosa Mayer Muños, owned an online gallery and sold art.
The couple's actual age, or whether they are a real couple, is unknown. However, they should have two children who went to an international school in Ljubljana, according to AP.
Sentenced to 27 years
Roman Seleznev, 40, is a convicted Russian hacker and credit card fraudster who served a 27-year prison sentence in the United States.
Seleznev was arrested in and extradited from the Maldives in 2014. He was convicted in the United States in April 2017 of hacking computers to steal and sell credit cards.
In November of the same year, he received another sentence, 14 years in prison. It concerned his participation in a cyber fraud network and for defrauding banks of millions.
Strong reactions
Altogether, 26 people have been exchanged.
Some of those who are allowed to come home to the West include the American Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, 32.
Another is US Marine Paul Whelan, 54. Russian opposition politician Vladimir Kara-Murza, 42, was also released from Russian prison.
UN Human Rights Commissioner Volker Türk has expressed relief to TT.
At the same time, "all journalists and human rights defenders who are imprisoned just for doing their job must be released," he says.
Steffen Hebestreit, a spokesman for the German government, has said that it was "not an easy decision" to release Vadim Krasikov.
Yulia Navalnaya, widow of the Russian regime critic Alexei Navalny, has expressed joy that political prisoners in Russia have reached freedom.
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