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      In Prisoner Swap, Echoes of Putin’s K.G.B. Past

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      A sprawling exchange with the West underscored the Russian president’s loyalty to his intelligence services. It also showed his continued interest in making deals.As he sat in a Russian jail for five months, the human rights champion Oleg Orlov sometimes grew wistful: What if he walked free someday as part of a deal between Russia and the West?The chances that President Vladimir V. Putin would make a prisoner swap like that seemed as remote as a “star twinkling far, far, far away on the horizon,” Mr. Orlov, 71, said this week. The dire state of the relationship between Moscow and the West, and their diverging interests, appeared to rule out the kind of detailed negotiation necessary for such a complicated deal.But last week, it happened, in the most far-reaching prisoner swap with Moscow since the Cold War: Mr. Putin and his ally Belarus freed Mr. Orlov and 15 other Russians, Germans and Americans in exchange for a convicted assassin and seven other Russians released by the West. It was a moment when Mr. Orlov saw anew how core Mr. Putin’s past with the K.G.B., the Soviet spy agency, was to the Russian president’s identity — and to the sort of country he’s trying to shape Russia into.The swap happened because “Putin is a K.G.B. man, an F.S.B. man,” Mr. Orlov said in a phone interview four days after two private jets carrying him and other released prisoners landed in Cologne, Germany. Espionage is a subject Mr. Orlov knows well, having spent decades studying the crimes of the Soviet secret police as a co-founder of the Memorial human rights group, which was awarded the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize.The Russian human rights champion Oleg Orlov, shown in court in Moscow in February, was freed in the exchange last week.Sergei Ilnitsky/EPA, via ShutterstockMr. Putin served as a K.G.B. agent in Dresden, East Germany, in the 1980s and ran the F.S.B., its domestic intelligence successor agency, in the 1990s. To the Russian leader, Mr. Orlov said, showing loyalty to the F.S.B. and other Russian intelligence services by winning their agents’ freedom trumped the political risk of releasing opposition figures whom the Kremlin had branded as traitors.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Japan’s Nikkei Rises as Asian Stocks Rebound from Sell-Off

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      The Nikkei 225, the benchmark index in Japan, rose on Tuesday after a record decline.Investors in Asia reclaimed a measure of calm on Tuesday, after a day of frenzied selling around the world over concerns about a potential U.S. recession.In Japan, where the losses Monday were largest, stocks bounced higher. The Nikkei 225 index rose 11 percent after plunging 12.4 percent the day before. That was the benchmark index’s biggest one-day point decline, larger than the plummet during the Black Monday crash in October 1987.Stocks in South Korea, which were also down more than 10 percent at one point on Monday, regained about 4 percent.The jolt to stock markets started last week in Japan, where worries about the state of the U.S. economy were compounded by concerns about the effects a rapidly strengthening yen would have on corporate profits.On Friday, a report on American jobs showed a considerable slowdown in hiring, prompting a sell-off in U.S. markets. More widespread panic took hold on Monday over fears that the Federal Reserve may have waited too long to start cutting interest rates, threatening the strength of the U.S. economy. On Wall Street, the S&P 500 fell 3 percent, its sharpest daily decline since September 2022.The Fed is expected to start cutting rates, which are at a more-than-two-decade high, later this year.Conditions in Japan have been complicated by a policy shift in the opposite direction. The Bank of Japan last Wednesday increased its key rate to a quarter point. It was only the central bank’s second rate increase since 2007. After years in which policymakers kept interest rates low to try to boost prices and consumption, inflation has risen to levels at which they felt they could begin raising rates.The prospect of higher rates caused the yen to strengthen, a trend that could be good for Japan’s economy over the longer term but will be a drag on corporate profits, especially for big companies that rely on selling abroad. The currency’s rise spooked investors, some of whom feared a stronger yen would spell the end of a more-than-yearlong rally in Japanese stocks that had been driven by a weakened currency.A stronger yen also undercut some global investments made when the currency was cheaper, acting as a catalyst to wider selling across markets already nervous that stock prices had risen too high, too quickly. A popular trade among some investors involved borrowing in yen, and then investing it in markets like the U.S. But as the strength of the dollar this year began to ebb, profits from that trade also started to reverse course.The yen weakened on Tuesday, trading at around 145 to the dollar, compared with 141 the previous day.While the chain reaction of a strengthening Japanese currency and declining stocks seems to have calmed, analysts expect large market fluctuations to carry forward until there is more clarity about the direction of the economy in the United States.Joe Rennison More

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      How Julien Alfred Beat Sha’Carri Richardson for Gold

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      Richardson’s slow start put her behind, a position she had been able to overcome in the past. But not on Saturday, as she rarely matched Alfred’s speed during any part of the race. Women’s 100-meter final results 1 Alfred 10.72s 23.15mph 25.50mph 2 Richardson 10.87s 22.84mph 25.18mph 3 Jefferson 10.92s 22.64mph 25.03mph 4 Neita 10.96s […] More

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      Long Johns, Forensics and a Bound Russian Killer: Inside the Big Prisoner Swap

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      The complex choreography caught some prisoners being freed in their robes and slippers, unaware of their fates, and required forensic experts to make positive identifications. The private jet that took off from southwest Germany on Thursday afternoon was carrying a group that may have never expected to be confined together: police officers, doctors, intelligence agents, a senior aide to Germany’s chancellor — and a convicted Russian assassin.In the back of the plane, the assassin, Vadim Krasikov, sat with his hands and feet bound and wearing a helmet that covered his face; he was not heard uttering a word on the entire flight.At the same time, a Russian government jet was also headed for Ankara, Turkey’s capital, carrying officers from the F.S.B. intelligence agency and 16 prisoners being released by Russia and Belarus. At one point, one of the F.S.B. escorts made what seemed like a bad joke to the two best-known Russian dissidents on board: “Don’t have too much fun out there, because Krasikov could come back for you.”This account of the tense hours surrounding the exchange — the biggest between Moscow and the West since the Cold War — is based on new details revealed by Western government officials involved in the process, and on early testimony from the Russian political prisoners released as part of the deal. The swap freed Mr. Krasikov, the American journalist Evan Gershkovich and 22 others in a complex seven-country deal that required intricate planning and timing. The successful transfer highlighted the ability of some of the world’s most powerful intelligence agencies to cooperate on a distinct operation of shared interest, even as Russia and the West engage in a tense standoff over the war in Ukraine.A photograph released by the Russian state news media showing the convicted killer Vadim Krasikov, center right in hat, at a Moscow airport on Thursday.Mikhail Voskresensky/Sputnik, via ReutersWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Man Pleads Guilty to Threatening to Kill Marjorie Taylor Greene

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      Sean Patrick Cirillo called Ms. Greene’s office and told staff members about his plans to kill the politician, the F.B.I. said. He faces a maximum of five years in prison.An Atlanta man pleaded guilty on Tuesday to making death threats against Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia.The man, Sean Patrick Cirillo, 34, made two threatening phone calls on Nov. 8, 2023, to Ms. Greene’s Washington, D.C., office, spoke to staff members and said that he planned to shoot the politician in the head, an F.B.I. agent said in court documents.“I’m gonna kill her next week,” Mr. Cirillo said, according to recordings of the phone call that were reviewed by the F.B.I. “I’m gonna murder her.”Mr. Cirillo pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Atlanta to one count of transmitting interstate threats. He will face a maximum possible penalty of five years in prison when he is sentenced on Nov. 7.“Threatening to kill a public official is reprehensible,” Ryan K. Buchanan, the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, said in a statement. “Our office will not tolerate any form of violence, threats or intimidation against public officials.”In a statement, Mr. Cirillo’s lawyer, Allison Dawson, said that Mr. Cirillo had struggled with mental health issues and was not on his prescribed medication at the time of the incident.Ms. Greene’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Tuesday.After Mr. Cirillo was arrested, Ms. Greene said in a statement to Atlanta News First: “Threats to murder elected officials should never be tolerated.”During his phone calls to Ms. Greene’s office, the F.B.I. said, Mr. Cirillo said that he was focusing on Ms. Greene through the sight of a sniper rifle. He also threatened to kill her staff members who picked up the two calls, which he made on Nov. 8 at 1:33 p.m. and 5:36 p.m., the F.B.I. said.The next day, when the F.B.I. showed up at Mr. Cirillo’s home by tracking his phone number, Mr. Cirillo admitted to making the calls, said he had made them to “get attention” and added that he had called “multiple other people as well including other members of Congress,” court records state. It is not clear who else received Mr. Cirillo’s calls.Mr. Cirillo’s guilty plea is the latest event in a recent pattern of threats toward political figures. Last week, a man was charged with threatening to assault and kill federal officials, judges and state employees across several states, including people involved in the prosecution of former President Donald J. Trump.In California, some elected officials said they were rethinking public office in light of increasing harassment.Kirsten Noyes More

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      Israel Says It Killed Hezbollah Commander in Airstrike Near Beirut

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      The strike was in retaliation for a deadly rocket attack this weekend in the Golan Heights. At least three civilians were killed and 74 others wounded on Tuesday, Lebanese officials said.Israel launched a deadly strike in a densely populated Beirut suburb on Tuesday in retaliation for a rocket attack in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights that it blamed Hezbollah for and that killed 12 children and teenagers on a soccer field.The target of the Israeli strike in a southern suburb of Lebanon’s capital was Fuad Shukr, a senior official who serves as a close adviser to Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, according to three Israeli security officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details.The Israel Defense Forces later said in a statement that its fighter jets had “eliminated” Mr. Shukr, but there was no confirmation from Hezbollah, the powerful Iran-backed group, and the claim could not be independently verified.Hezbollah has denied carrying out the attack in the Golan Heights on Saturday. The latest strikes were likely to fuel concerns that Israel’s long-running conflict with the group could escalate into a full-blown war even as Israel wages a military offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip after that group led a deadly assault in Israel on Oct. 7.The attack on Tuesday is believed to be the first time since the war with Hamas began that Israel has targeted Hezbollah in Beirut. In January, an Israeli airstrike in a Beirut suburb killed Saleh al-Arouri, a senior leader of Hamas, which is also backed by Iran.The strike on Tuesday killed at least three other people — a woman and two children — and wounded at least 74 others, five critically, according to Lebanon’s Ministry of Health. Officials were still searching the rubble for other victims, the ministry said. More