Russia‘s release of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich is very good news. Others released in a major United States-Germany-Slovenia-Russia prisoner swap on Thursday include Americans Paul Whelan and Alsu Kurmasheva. Whelan was caught in an FSB sting operation and Kurmasheva for reporting on the war in Ukraine. A number of German citizens and residents and prominent Russian political opposition figures such as Vladimir Kara-Murza have also been released.

For its part, Russia has repatriated both SVR foreign intelligence service and GRU military intelligence service illegals, or spies operating without diplomatic cover. But Russian President Vladimir Putin’s prize is Vadim Krasikov. A former FSB officer and member of the Russian domestic security service’s Vympel special forces unit, Krasikov assassinated a Chechen dissident in a Berlin park in 2019. Putin had been clear about his desire to see Krasikov traded for Gershkovich. The significant number of Germans freed in this exchange underlines the German government’s high price for being willing to release a killer.