The Russian Foreign Ministry said that the United States itself decided to exchange basketball player Brittney Griner instead of former Marine Paul Whelan. According to the department’s representative, Maria Zakharova, Whelan was not even on the prisoner exchange lists with Russia.
She also pointed out that it was rather strange to bring Whelan’s relatives to a meeting of the UN Security Council.
“Recently, an exchange took place, during which the American government preferred to send back to his country not Paul Whelan, but an American basketball player who was taken away for transporting drugs,” Zakharova told Sputnik radio.
Earlier, Zakharova denied the US State Department’s statement regarding the conversation between Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken over the Paul Whelan swap.
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