Episode Transcript
Transcripts are displayed as originally observed. Some content, including advertisements may have changed.
Use Ctrl + F to search
0:00
One focus, one subject. Welcome to
0:02
The Real Story, the podcast that
0:04
brings together global experts to explain
0:07
one issue shaping the news. BBC
0:10
World Service podcasts are supported
0:12
by advertising. Hello, I'm
0:14
Katja Adler, host of the Global Story
0:16
podcast from the BBC World Service. The
0:18
Global Story brings you fresh takes and
0:21
smart perspectives from BBC journalists all around
0:23
the world. We're dropping a bonus episode
0:25
of our podcast into the Real Story
0:27
feed every day this week and if
0:30
you'd like to hear more of our
0:32
previous episodes, we hope you do, search
0:34
BBC The Global Story wherever you
0:36
get your BBC podcasts. Exactly
0:42
one year ago, an American journalist in
0:44
Russia failed to check in with his
0:46
newspaper using their agreed security system. The
0:49
Wall Street Journal, Evan Gershkowitz's employer,
0:51
didn't panic. A missed check-in could
0:54
mean a flat phone battery, of
0:56
course, but a second missed check-in
0:58
the next morning prompted his bosses
1:00
to contact US national security and
1:02
reports began to circulate of a
1:04
US journalist missing in Russia. The
1:06
American journalist based in Moscow, Evan Gershkowitz, he's
1:09
been arrested in Russia, accused of spying while
1:11
working for the Wall Street Journal. Evan
1:13
had been arrested for espionage, the
1:15
first US journalist charged with spying
1:17
in Russia since the Cold War.
1:19
His bosses and the US government
1:21
say it's a lie. The
1:24
messages release him, release him now.
1:27
He was and is a
1:29
journalist who was doing his
1:31
job, doing nothing wrong. The
1:33
insinuations that he was somehow
1:37
engaging in some kind of criminal
1:40
activity is just
1:42
flat out false.
1:45
A year on and his pretrial
1:47
detention has been repeatedly extended. So
1:50
today we're asking, what will it
1:52
take to release Evan Gershkowitz? We've
1:59
called up Will Vernon. who's our BBC
2:01
reporter in Washington, DC, but who
2:03
spent many years reporting from Moscow.
2:06
Hi, Will. Hi, Katia. Also
2:08
with us, James Beardsworth, a friend of
2:10
Evan's and a journalist for BBC World
2:12
Service. And formerly, you also wrote for
2:14
the Moscow Times, just like Evan. Hi
2:17
Katia, good to be with you. Hi, James, so
2:19
nice to have you with us because you
2:21
both know Will on a personal level
2:24
as well as a professional level. Will,
2:27
you were in Russia reporting for
2:29
the BBC, actually, when Evan was
2:31
arrested. Where were you exactly?
2:34
And what do you remember of when the news broke? Well, the
2:36
day we learned that Evan
2:38
had been arrested, I was reading some
2:40
reports on local media in Yekaterinburg, that's
2:43
the city in which Evan
2:45
was arrested. These reports saying that he'd
2:48
disappeared. And I
2:50
immediately started calling people, messaging friends
2:53
of mine who know him better than I do. I remember
2:55
I messaged Francesca Abel from the
2:57
Washington Post, a few others. And I
2:59
went into the BBC Moscow Bureau about
3:02
half an hour later, I can still see it
3:04
now. I was sitting at my computer
3:06
and up flashed this
3:08
statement on the Russian wire
3:11
agencies, a statement from the
3:13
FSB, that's Russia's security service,
3:15
basically the secret police, saying
3:18
Evan had been detained on suspicion
3:20
of espionage. My heart sank right
3:22
down to my boots. I
3:24
called our bosses in
3:27
London, told them exactly what had happened. We
3:30
then heard that same day that Evan was going
3:32
to appear in court. So we jumped in the
3:34
car, raced to the courtroom. It
3:36
was a court building and we went
3:38
there and we did a report for
3:41
that day's 10 o'clock news about
3:43
our friend and colleague who'd been
3:45
arrested. And in the next
3:47
few days, the small number of foreign
3:49
journalists who still remained in Moscow
3:51
at that point, everyone
3:54
was in utter disbelief, fear,
3:56
shock. We were
3:58
thinking, do we need to go straight to the end? airport,
4:00
you know, get out of the country immediately.
4:02
Some people did do that, some people did
4:05
jump in a car, went straight to the
4:07
airport and got out of Russia. But for
4:10
a long time after that day,
4:12
every night when I
4:14
was kind of going to sleep, I kept thinking about
4:16
Evan falling asleep, also in Moscow,
4:18
but in a jail cell and
4:20
left off to a prison. So it was
4:23
awful. James, again, a really
4:26
good friend of Evan's and Will
4:28
was saying his heart sunk right down,
4:31
you know, into his boots and further,
4:33
you and Evan met playing five-a-side football
4:35
in Moscow, didn't you? So what
4:38
did you think when all of a
4:40
sudden your close friend's name was on
4:42
every news outlet in and outside
4:44
Russia? I remember exactly where I was when I
4:46
found out the news. I actually was a friend
4:48
of mine that just texted me saying Evan's been
4:50
arrested and I looked out, I looked on my
4:52
phone and looked on Telegram and it was a
4:54
video of him sort of being bundled from a
4:56
sort of black car into a police station, really,
4:58
away with later sort of appearing caught. I was
5:00
just absolutely shocked. The first thing that I did
5:03
was I pulled out my phone and I just
5:05
sort of sent a text to him saying some
5:07
thoughts with you, mate, which I guess
5:09
in hindsight, given the sort of scale of the
5:11
crisis seems like a bit of a ridiculous thing.
5:13
But obviously at the time, none
5:15
of us really were aware what the next
5:17
steps were. And then from there, it was
5:19
just bringing mutual friends of ours talking about,
5:21
you know, things like, you know, just raising
5:24
awareness, raising money for Evan's family and talking
5:26
about what we can really do from afar.
5:28
And that's where obviously things like the letter
5:30
campaign came from. And it's
5:32
good to see that these things are still obviously continuing now. Now,
5:35
before we get in detail as to
5:37
what's happened to Evan since that day
5:39
and how his release could be secured,
5:41
I'd like to. And I'm sure our
5:44
listeners would really love to get to
5:46
know him a bit more. James, Evan
5:49
encouraged you to become a journalist, didn't he? I
5:51
mean, he is passionate about
5:53
his job. I first met Evan in 2019
5:55
when I moved out to Moscow and I
5:57
started playing football in a five a side.
6:00
League and Evan was a player who played for
6:02
an opposing team but often it was quite friendly
6:04
and you'd always sort of go out and meet
6:06
the other players after the game and I told
6:08
Evan at the time that I was sort of
6:10
I was teaching but I was also freelance writing
6:12
and he really sort of showed an interest in
6:14
this he sort of asked a lot about what
6:16
my work was and what I was interested in
6:18
doing and then every time I'd see me
6:20
sort of share ideas with me and
6:22
talk about it and he was obviously working at the
6:24
Moscow Times at the time and he was always really
6:27
encouraging me to have a think about going into more
6:29
of a reporter role full-time in Russia
6:32
and I remember when two years down the line a job
6:34
did come up I rang Evan and I said look I'm
6:36
thinking about going for this job but I'm not sure where
6:39
I stand whether I've got the credentials and he sort
6:41
of really reassured me told me to sort of do's
6:43
and do nots and he's sort of like my first
6:45
point of call ever for mentoring journalism in terms of
6:48
you know what's the how is the best way about
6:50
going about things and also sort of tackling Russia which
6:52
has become increasingly difficult in the last few
6:55
years well what do you
6:57
think of Evan as a journalist and
6:59
and how is he more generally
7:01
regarded in the journalistic field
7:04
there well Evans a fantastic
7:06
journalist his pieces are always packed
7:08
full of real people real voices
7:10
when he goes
7:13
on assignments you can tell that he's what's
7:15
known in Russia as a ballad torn right someone
7:17
who chats away all the time he
7:21
chats to anybody and everybody and that's what
7:23
a journalist should do they get out there
7:25
and talk to people find out stuff tell
7:27
people stories and that's what Evan did he's
7:29
also very good at finding people I remember
7:32
we'd often read his reports in
7:34
the Moscow Bureau and I'd say to my colleagues
7:36
you know goodness me how on earth did Evan
7:38
find that person you know I'd love to speak
7:40
to them he clearly loves
7:42
the country the people he
7:44
finds everything about Russia and Ukraine and the
7:46
former Soviet Union fascinating and we
7:49
hear this phrase don't we quite a lot of fearless
7:51
reporter but he really is fearless he
7:53
went to places that other people were
7:55
too nervous to go I remember him
7:57
calling me up a few weeks for
8:00
his arrest and said he was going to
8:02
Bilghardt. This is a Russian city right on
8:04
the border with Ukraine. Lots of shelling, lots
8:06
of military presence there, soldiers
8:08
and tanks going in and out of Ukraine.
8:12
He said his bosses would feel a lot
8:14
better if he went with someone else, but
8:16
for safety and security reasons, where
8:18
are we planning to go? I said
8:20
to him, we couldn't go at that time, but he
8:23
went anyway, because he
8:25
really wanted to tell that story and he
8:27
wrote an excellent piece. He's also just a
8:29
really nice, friendly guy. He
8:31
has a massive smile, he's hilarious, he's very
8:34
witty, he's very clever. I mean, it's a
8:36
cliche, but he really is the life and
8:38
soul of the party. And James,
8:40
he does have that connection with Russia,
8:42
doesn't he, through his family. He grew
8:44
up speaking Russian up until his arrest
8:47
and obviously, you know, everyone will want
8:49
to talk to him when
8:51
everyone hopes he is released, but what did
8:53
it mean to him to be
8:55
working in Russia? His family
8:57
had left Russia during the Soviet Union and
9:00
he returned to a Russia that was completely
9:02
different from the one that his family had
9:04
left. And I remember he
9:06
sort of took great pride in showing
9:08
his family Russia when they came over,
9:10
obviously having visited Evan in Moscow and
9:12
seeing this totally transformed country. And
9:15
he sort of grew up with that part of
9:17
Russia being kind of missing piece in him. And
9:19
I think going over to Moscow, sort of it
9:21
was almost completed him in that sense. He sort
9:24
of got to know this country, he recognized that
9:26
it sort of opened so many doors for him.
9:29
He liked to get about, he liked to travel to all sorts
9:31
of different places. He had a real sort of hunger. He
9:33
was constantly inviting me to sort of really obscure
9:35
parts of Russia. And I think he really thought
9:37
that it was important that Russia was viewed not
9:39
just through the lens of the sort of big
9:41
cosmopolitan cities, but also, you know, in the Far
9:44
East. A lot of Evan's work, when you read
9:46
it, it will be really shining a light on
9:48
people in Russia that you do not hear. I
9:50
remember it was Evan who first gave
9:52
me a piece of advice, which is like, really,
9:54
when you're writing about Russia, the less you can
9:56
mention the president's name, the better, because that's ultimately,
9:58
you know, you're then writing about Russia. different
10:00
aspects of the country that we don't see
10:02
a lot of time in Western media and
10:04
you're hearing voices that often go unheard.
10:10
And after the full-scale invasion, well as you said,
10:12
I mean you stayed but
10:14
you left subsequent to
10:17
Evan's arrest. Yeah, I
10:19
mean for many journalists, Evan's
10:21
arrest completely changed the
10:23
risk versus reward balancing act
10:26
that we'd all been playing for years in Russia.
10:29
It changed it for me. You
10:31
know, Russia, yes it was a risky
10:33
place to do journalism but the rewards
10:36
were also considerable. Russia is a fascinating
10:38
country. It's important work that Evan was
10:41
doing, we were doing, others were doing.
10:43
These people's stories needed to be told.
10:46
So the balance really tipped
10:49
in favor of reward over risk for a
10:51
long time but for many people, not
10:54
for everyone but for many, that did
10:56
change when Evan got arrested. And
10:59
for Russian journalists, I mean we're
11:01
more familiar with the
11:04
intimidation of certain Russian journalists, independent Russian
11:06
journalists going back a long way. What's
11:10
the situation like now? Well
11:13
the situation is pretty grim and
11:16
I think Evan's arrest showed that. No
11:20
one really is safe in Russia
11:22
anymore, no one. Russia
11:24
sees all manifestations of
11:27
a free press, Western values, Western
11:30
organizations as a danger, as a
11:32
threat. There is
11:34
no free press in Russia anymore. Every
11:37
single mainstream independent media organization now has
11:39
been shut down or silenced or forced
11:41
out of the country. And
11:44
over 20 Russian journalists are
11:46
in prison in Russia and hundreds, perhaps
11:48
thousands more are in exile
11:50
abroad. So the situation
11:52
for Russian journalists
11:54
is incredibly grim and
11:57
it's getting worse, every
11:59
day. Maybe not every day,
12:01
but every week, every month, we hear
12:03
of more arrests, of more
12:06
repression. So Russia
12:08
is really on a downward trajectory, really,
12:10
in terms of press
12:12
freedom and repression in general. We've
12:15
got to know Evan Goshkovich a bit
12:17
better on a personal level and talked
12:19
about the conditions in which he and
12:22
other journalists have been reporting in
12:24
Russia. And next, we're going to get
12:26
into what life's been like for Evan
12:28
since his arrest and what it might
12:30
take to print his release. Botox
12:36
Cosmetic, out of Botulinum Toxin A,
12:38
FDA approved for over 20 years. So,
12:41
talk to your specialist to see if Botox
12:43
Cosmetic is right for you. For
12:45
full prescribing information, including boxed
12:48
warning, visit botoxcosmetic.com or call
12:50
877-351-0300. Remember
12:54
to ask for Botox Cosmetic by name.
12:57
To see for yourself and
12:59
learn more, visit botoxcosmetic.com. That's
13:02
Botox Cosmetic. This
13:12
is the Global Story. We bring you
13:14
one big international story in detail five
13:16
days a week. Follow or subscribe wherever
13:18
you listen. With me is
13:20
Will Vernon and James Beardsworth. We've heard
13:22
about what Evan is like as a
13:24
friend and a journalist and why he's
13:26
been so committed to reporting across Russia.
13:29
And now we're going to get a look at what's
13:31
been happening since his arrest. Will,
13:34
can you remind us what exactly
13:36
is Evan charged with and what's
13:39
his current status? Evan was
13:41
arrested in March 2023 on the 29th of March.
13:45
He was then transferred to pretrial
13:47
detention in Lefortovo Prison. He was
13:49
also in a court
13:55
a number of times and each time
13:57
he's been remanded in custody pending trial.
14:00
On Tuesday, this week, he was remanded
14:02
in custody once again. He'll be there
14:04
at least until late June. Now
14:07
he's been charged with espionage. That is
14:09
up to 20 years in prison. The
14:12
authorities haven't presented any evidence publicly.
14:14
All they've said is that Evan was
14:16
caught red-handed. This is
14:19
a closed court, a secret
14:21
trial, so we don't know
14:24
many of the details. It's unlikely
14:26
we'll hear any more details for a while.
14:28
And these things can often take months
14:30
or years to come to trial. And
14:32
of course we heard US President Joe Biden,
14:34
he took to the media to speak about Evan.
14:36
We're working every day to secure his release.
14:41
Looking at opportunities and tools to bring him
14:43
home. But what specifically,
14:45
James, are Evan's
14:47
lawyers, The Wall Street Journal, the
14:50
newspaper he works for, and his
14:52
family saying about the charges levelled
14:54
against him. Well of course they've vehemently
14:56
denied the charges put against Evan. We know
14:58
these are bogus charges. We know that Evan
15:01
has never worked for the American government. And
15:03
we know that he was a reporter and he's
15:05
been a reporter since he moved out to Moscow.
15:07
That's what he does and that's what he loves
15:09
to do. So other than obviously deny the fact
15:11
that he's clearly not a spy, there is of
15:13
course no evidence, as Will
15:15
says, that's been presented against him. That
15:18
is all that they can really do. And you've
15:20
both exchanged letters with him in prison.
15:24
What's his life there like,
15:27
James? He remains unbroken. As Will says,
15:29
we've seen him a number of times in
15:31
court. He looks in good shape from
15:33
what we know from the letters. He remains in good
15:35
spirits. He lives in a
15:38
small cell with a cell mate and
15:40
he has one hour access to the
15:42
outside a day. He's keeping
15:44
himself fit. It was arranged that a book would be
15:46
sent to him so he can do bodyweight exercises so
15:48
within his small cell he can work out. He
15:51
also keeps up to date with what's going on in
15:53
the world and current affairs. He has a small TV
15:55
in his cell. Lynne Tracy, the US
15:57
ambassador, talked about the fact that every time she meets...
16:00
He has questions about US current affairs.
16:02
He also mentioned in a letter to a friend
16:04
recently about a niche footballer within the Premier League
16:07
So he's obviously keeping up to date with what's
16:09
going on in the football. He's a big Arsenal
16:11
fan, isn't he? He is indeed.
16:13
Yeah, he's a big Arsenal fan me and Evan
16:15
would go and watch Arsenal together in Moscow He
16:18
does get the scores, but about apparently he's about two
16:20
weeks behind I remember joking in in
16:22
a letter with him last season because it all
16:24
at one point looked good for Arsenal Then it
16:26
all sort of started to go badly and I
16:29
said well to be honest, mate You probably best
16:31
not in the know than in the know right now
16:33
So yeah, and of course the fort
16:35
of a prison is designed to isolate and
16:38
in letters as I say He plays chess
16:40
with family. He likes to he likes to
16:42
ask about sort of gossip and What's
16:45
going on and he just wants to hear really all of the
16:47
things he's missing out on and when we have
16:49
seen him in court It's
16:51
behind it. It's sort of like a glass.
16:54
How would you describe it? It's like a
16:56
glass cage almost he seems determined to smile
16:58
doesn't he will he's managed somehow to to
17:00
get flowers sent to his sister on International
17:03
Women's Day I was catching up with
17:05
an interview with her How does that
17:07
work and how does the letter system
17:09
work? So you can write letters to Evan?
17:12
They must be written in Russian. I write letters
17:14
to him in Russian send them directly to the
17:16
prison Obviously all the letters
17:18
are opened and read by the Russian
17:20
authorities as they are in prisons in
17:22
most countries including the UK So it's
17:24
it's not possible to discuss anything, you
17:26
know significantly political or about his case
17:28
in any way So Evan's
17:31
friends have set up a website where people can
17:33
write to him in English They then translate those
17:35
letters send them to the fort of a prison
17:38
That's at free gerskovich.com and
17:40
you can also access the Wall Street Journal websites
17:42
They also have a portal where you can send
17:45
a letter But you mentioned the
17:47
pictures that we see of him in court Evans
17:50
standing inside a glass tank. It's
17:52
called an aquarium in kind
17:54
of Russian legal slang But seeing
17:56
those pictures you might think that this is
17:59
an open court in
18:01
which press are allowed, but of course it's not.
18:04
What really happens at the beginning
18:06
of these secret closed court cases
18:08
is journalists, photographers, cameramen are
18:10
allowed in for 10 minutes at the beginning
18:13
to take a few pictures and
18:15
then are shut out again. The
18:17
authorities in Russia keep extending his
18:20
detention. They extended it again this
18:23
week. How can he move on,
18:25
James, from this limbo being held
18:27
without conviction? What options are
18:30
there to bring about his release? It's obviously immensely
18:32
frustrating, not only as an onlooker, but I'm
18:34
sure for Evan we do know that he
18:36
does want to be sentenced because he sees
18:38
a sentencing as that next step before he
18:40
can possibly be exchanged.
18:43
Now obviously there is precedent here. There's Paul
18:45
Whelan, who is another US citizen who remains
18:47
in jail. I think he waited something like
18:49
a year and a half on pretrial. And
18:52
then there was also Brittany Grine, who I think was just slightly less than
18:54
a year. So obviously there remains a
18:56
lot of hope that in the next few months
18:58
there may be a trial date set
19:00
and Evan will be able to be
19:02
sentenced and then obviously transferred away from
19:04
the fort of her to another prison
19:06
where hopefully he should have more opportunities
19:08
to socialize. Obviously we know he's
19:10
a curious person that likes to meet people. And
19:13
I'm sure that he'll be wanting to even
19:16
inside the prison walls meet new people, meet new
19:18
contacts and come out with all of these stories.
19:20
Well President Biden, we've heard him say
19:23
repeatedly that everything is being done to
19:25
secure Evan's release. But what options are
19:28
there? We'll go into the idea of
19:30
a prison exchange in a moment. But
19:32
other options? Well it's difficult to imagine
19:35
what other options there could be. I mean
19:37
certainly we can't hope for any sort of
19:39
acquittal trial. There
19:42
is a guilty verdict in over 99%
19:44
of criminal cases in Russia.
19:46
The judiciary, the court system is
19:48
not independent. Others will issue any
19:50
verdict they're told to do by
19:52
the authorities. You know, juries are
19:54
rarely used. This is a secret
19:56
case, as I said. We don't
19:58
know what the quota... quote, evidence
20:01
is against Evan. They often do
20:03
this with cases linked to national
20:06
security. So I think a prisoner
20:08
swap really is the only hope for Evan, aside
20:10
from any kind of major political
20:13
changes in Russia. So
20:15
what usually happens is someone
20:17
is found guilty, sentenced, sent
20:20
to prison, then President Putin
20:22
officially pardons the person and
20:24
they're released. The
20:26
Kremlin can do whatever it wants. If
20:28
Putin decides he wants Evan Gerskowitz released,
20:30
all it would take is one phone call and
20:32
Evan would be out. But I think probably we'll
20:34
have to wait until after the trial. Yeah,
20:37
absolutely. And there is regular contact between
20:39
Evans parents and the White House. And
20:41
I believe Roger Carstens, the US hostage
20:43
negotiator, is in contact with them every
20:46
week. We're going to go in prepared
20:48
to discuss and we think
20:50
we know what direction it might go. But the
20:52
Russians, you know, they're tough negotiators and they may
20:54
take it in another direction. And that's
20:56
fine. We're going to find a way to meet,
20:58
close the gap between two sides and find a
21:00
way to bring Evan home. We
21:06
have to be honest, though, don't we? And obviously, there's a
21:08
huge amount of there's a huge
21:10
ethical discussion attached to this. But the
21:13
assumption is, is that this could well
21:15
end with a prisoner swap. Well,
21:18
what signs have there been from
21:20
President Putin? And do you
21:22
think they're credible signs that this may be what
21:24
he's thinking? Well, firstly, we
21:26
should say that prisoner swaps are
21:29
extremely secret affairs. Governments mostly don't
21:31
comment publicly on the details of
21:33
them. But you're right that President
21:35
Putin has mentioned the possibility of
21:37
swapping Evan several times in speeches
21:40
and answers to questions. There have
21:42
also been reports in a number
21:44
of media outlets that a swap
21:46
is being negotiated. In Mr. Putin's
21:49
interview with Tucker Carlson, he's the
21:51
right wing American media personality. Putin
21:53
suggested an agreement can be reached.
21:56
And then he mentioned a man imprisoned
21:58
in a US allied country. country for
22:00
liquidating a bandit who had killed Russian
22:03
soldiers during the fighting in the Caucasus.
22:05
Now, there's only one man President
22:07
Putin could be talking about there, and
22:10
that is Vadim Krasikov. So, he is
22:12
a Russian man in prison in Germany,
22:14
a convicted killer. He shot
22:16
dead a Georgian man, Zelim Hangushvili, in
22:18
a Berlin park in 2019. Now,
22:21
Mr. Hangushvili fought against Russian forces
22:23
in the north Caucasus, was accused
22:25
of war crimes. And
22:28
German authorities said that Vadim Krasikov,
22:30
his killer, was basically a hitman,
22:33
was an assassin sent by the
22:35
Russian intelligence services. So, he was
22:37
sentenced to life imprisonment. He is in
22:39
prison in Germany, and
22:41
Vladimir Putin desperately wants Vadim
22:44
Krasikov back in Russia. Why?
22:46
The reason he wants him back is
22:48
twofold. Firstly, I think the Kremlin
22:51
is concerned that Krasikov may talk.
22:54
Most intelligence will most certainly be working
22:56
with him, talking to him, maybe trying to
22:59
get a deal, you know, will
23:01
reduce your sentence if you tell us how
23:03
the Russian intelligence services operate. You
23:05
know, they left you here. And
23:08
I think as more time goes on, there's
23:10
more of a likelihood that Krasikov could feel
23:12
abandoned. He might talk. And I think the
23:15
Kremlin knows that and wants to get him
23:17
back. But I think the other reason they
23:19
want him back is so that it doesn't
23:21
act as a deterrent, right? It
23:24
would be assassins deployed overseas. Vadim
23:26
Krasikov is a high profile figure.
23:28
Everyone in Russia, in the intelligence
23:31
community, knows he's sitting there in
23:33
a jail cell in Germany.
23:35
So, I think other potential hitmen
23:38
could look at that and think, well, I'm not going
23:40
to do that. If I get
23:42
caught, if I get arrested, I'm going to
23:44
be left there and abandoned. Is there any other
23:46
diplomatic pressure the US can
23:49
put on Moscow? There's almost no
23:51
pressure America can put on Russia
23:53
because all the pressure's already been exerted, right? The
23:56
tank is empty. All the diplomatic
23:58
levers have been pulled. Buttons
24:00
pushed. Russia's already the most sanctioned
24:02
country on Earth. Almost all aspects
24:05
of the economy, the government, the
24:07
military, have US and other international
24:09
sanctions against them. The
24:11
top brass of the Russian government, even
24:14
the middle brass of the Russian government,
24:16
have personal sanctions against them too. Frankly,
24:18
there are no other options left. Well,
24:21
thank you, James. Thank you. And
24:23
on a personal level, I mean,
24:25
I remember very well, years
24:28
ago when a friend, a good friend and a
24:30
colleague of mine, different
24:32
circumstances, of course, but he was
24:34
kidnapped in the Middle East and
24:37
every night, and before his
24:39
thankfully safe return, I just stayed awake
24:41
thinking of how he was and where
24:43
he was and how he was faring.
24:45
So I know how much your
24:48
thoughts are with Evan. Thank you very much both
24:50
of you for your time. You're welcome.
24:52
Thank you, Katja. Cheers, Will. Cheers, James. Hope
24:54
to meet you one day. Thanks
24:57
for taking the time to listen to this
24:59
episode of ours. If you want to hear
25:01
more, search BBC The Global Story wherever you
25:03
get your BBC podcasts. And
25:06
don't forget to subscribe so you never miss
25:08
an episode.
Podchaser is the ultimate destination for podcast data, search, and discovery. Learn More