US government’s top hostage negotiator defends prisoner swaps with foreign adversaries

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. government’s top hostage negotiator defended prisoner swaps that free Americans wrongfully detained by foreign countries in exchange for the release of convicted criminals, denying on Thursday that such deals incentivize additional arrests of U.S. citizens.

“The math just isn’t adding up — it’s going in the other direction,” said Roger Carstens, the special presidential envoy for hostage affairs. He said the list of wrongfully detained Americans has grown shorter even as the Biden administration has proved willing to make deals with adversaries. “My numbers are actually going down.”

Speaking to a House subcommittee, Carstens said the deals are “always hard decisions” and that the U.S. government often spends years trying to understand what the other side wants to release American prisoners.

The swaps have generally required the U.S. to give up individuals in its prisons sought by an adversary. To get home WNBA star Brittney Griner from Russia, for instance, the U.S. released arms trafficker Viktor Bout.

Last December, the Biden administration freed a close ally of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro who was jailed on money laundering charges, in exchange for the release of 10 Americans behind bars in the South American country and the return of a fugitive businessman, Leonard Glenn Francis.

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