The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) welcomes with great joy and relief the release of 16 American, Russian, and German political prisoners held by the Russian government in a large-scale prisoner exchange. Among those freed are prominent figures who have long been voices for a free, democratic, and peaceful Russia.
Leading the list of those released today are Oleg Orlov, a leader of the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize laureate human rights group Memorial; Vladimir Kara-Murza, an opposition politician and journalist whose Washington Post columns from prison earned the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary; and opposition leader Ilya Yashin. Their only “crimes,” like those of their Russian compatriots released today, were speaking out openly and fearlessly against the Putin regime’s brutal war in Ukraine and its repression of Russian citizens.
Russia’s imprisonment of American citizens, including the conviction of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and RFE/RL journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, was similarly unjust—a cynical tactic by a criminal regime to attack free media and harm innocent civilians for political leverage.
“We join with families and friends to celebrate all those released from Russian prisons today. For those Russians imprisoned for their political and human rights activities, we honor them as heroes of their homeland and as champions of the cause of freedom. We also extend our deepest gratitude to those who made today possible through their tireless advocacy efforts and painstaking diplomacy on behalf of Vladimir Kara-Murza, Oleg Orlov, Ilya Yashin, Evan Gershkovich, and others unjustly held by the Russian regime,” says NED President and CEO Damon Wilson. “We remain painfully conscious of the fact that those released today represent only a small proportion of the more than 700 political prisoners held in Russia. We call on the Russian regime to immediately release all remaining political prisoners. NED will continue our support for their cause until every one of them is free.”
In a letter read by his wife Evgenia Kara-Murza at NED’s 2024 Democracy Awards in June, Vladimir Kara-Murza expressed solidarity for all Russian citizens who have been jailed for standing up to the Putin regime. “Today’s Russia holds more political prisoners than the Soviet Union did in its later years, and behind these numbers are people of all ages and all walks of life who have refused to stay silent in the face of the atrocities committed by Putin’s regime,” wrote Kara-Murza. “I have met many of them over the past two years. We have shared prison cells, police vans, cramped Stolypin wagons, courthouse prisoner holding cells. And each and every one of them has made me proud of my Russia, the Russia of Boris Nemtsov and Alexei Navalny, the Russia I call home.”
