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Washington politicians — eager for any signal that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s grip on power could loosen — say they’re hoping the dissidents freed in last week’s prisoner swap can re-energize the Russian opposition.
Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post contributor Vladimir Kara-Murza, Ilya Yashin, Andrei Pivovarov, are three of the most prominent opposition figures in the swap, which also freed several associates of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny — who died in a Russian prison in February.
Since Navalny’s death, some corners of the Russian opposition have grown increasingly despondent and fragmented. Many young Russians believed Navalny represented their last chance for liberal, democratic change.
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Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said in an interview that prisoner swap was a “good exchange” and expressed hope that Yashin, Kara-Murza, and others would be able to carry on Navalny’s message of democracy now that they are no longer behind bars.
“The Russian opposition prisoners who were released, they have an opportunity to amplify that voice,” Tillis said.
“And it’s one that I think resonates more than what most people think in Russia,” he added. “We just have to bust through Putin and his thugs that are running the country right now.”
There’s also the chance, however, that the swap could weaken the opposition movement. Navalny himself returned to Russia in 2021 after an attempted assassination — knowing he was likely to be arrested — because he said he could be a more effective voice against Putin inside the country, even behind bars. Yashin and some other opposition members expressed anger and frustration at being released from prison, saying that they had not consented to leave Russia and preferred to remain in their own country.
Yashin said at a press conference on Friday that he fought until the very last day to remain in Moscow, considering himself to be “a Russian politician, Russian patriot, and Russian citizen whose place is in Russia.”
Putin has used his full-scale invasion of Ukraine to increase patriotic sentiment and he may take advantage of the prisoner exchange to depict Yashin, Kara-Murza and the other members of the opposition as Western agents that the Americans and Germans were desperate to receive in return for Russian spies and assassins.
While opposition movements often flounder in exile, Russia watchers in Washington say there’s a chance for this to be the exception.
Michael McFaul, who served as the U.S. ambassador to Russia under the Obama administration, said that “Kara-Murza and Yashin are two of Russia’s most talented and courageous Russian political leaders.”
“I have no doubt that their freedom now will provide new energy and focus to Russia’s democratic movement,” he added.
Though Kara-Murza is more widely known in the United States and Europe, Yashin, 41, is considered to be the most popular opposition politician inside Russia.
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) stressed that the decision to include these dissidents in the deal also showed that the U.S. and the West would be there to support people taking risks to push back against Putin and authoritarian regimes in general.
“It speaks to a very smart policy by this administration to, of course, prioritize Americans but also realize that we can’t stand up for democracy globally if we aren’t supporting freedom fighters inside places like Russia,” Murphy said.
And there was a real possibility of these leaders dying behind bars, and Moscow preventing their message from getting out. Russia’s war in Ukraine spiked concerns among Navalny’s inner circle that they had underestimated the extent to which Putin’s government might torture or kill jailed opposition members. And Navalny’s death realized their worst fears.
“I was sure I’m going to die in prison,” Kara-Murza said in a phone call with President Joe Biden on Thursday. “I just want you to know that you’ve done a wonderful thing by saving so many people.”
The freed opposition members will now try to instill those same values in Russia. Whether they succeed, “depends on what they do and how they organize themselves,” said Fiona Hill, a longtime Russia expert who worked in three U.S. presidential administrations.
“My goal is returning to Russia,” Yashin said at the Friday press conference. “My goal is a free and happy Russia.”
“I’ve dedicated my life to that and I will continue to dedicate my life to that,” he added.
