This was announced by her legal team on Wednesday. The two-time Olympic champion was arrested at a Moscow airport on February 17, a week before Russia launched a war of aggression in Ukraine, with so-called vape cartridges containing cannabis oil, which is banned in Russia.
Griner was sentenced Aug. 4 to nine years in a penal colony for drug possession and smuggling. Griner had pleaded guilty but admitted an “honest mistake” and said she had no intention of breaking the law.
Neither Griner’s exact whereabouts nor her ultimate destination are known, the legal team said in a statement, adding that in accordance with Russian procedures, her attorneys as well as the US Embassy should be notified upon her arrival. It would take up to two weeks for the notification to arrive.
The White House said US President Joe Biden had directed his administration to “intervene with her Russian captors to improve her treatment and the conditions she endures in a penal colony.”
The Biden administration proposed a prisoner swap with Russia in late July to secure her release and that of former US Marine Paul Whelan, but Moscow has so far not responded positively to the offer.
“Despite the Russians’ unwillingness to negotiate in good faith, the US government has pursued this offer and proposed alternative options to the Russians through all available channels,” said White House spokeswoman Karinne Jean-Pierre.
Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, in an earlier statement, called the conditions in which Griner is being held “intolerable” and the trial she had to go through “another sham trial.”
Whelan was convicted of espionage by Russia and jailed for 16 years in 2020. He denies espionage and says he was framed in a covert operation.
Source: Nachrichten
