Russia has released a 74-year-old American citizen who was jailed for allegedly fighting on behalf of Ukraine, as President Vladimir Putin met US envoy Steve Witkoff in St Petersburg for talks.
Stephen Hubbard has been taken to the city’s Pulkovo Airport, Putin said during the meeting early on Wednesday.
President Donald Trump later said the former teacher was “on his way back home” and “there was no ‘swap’ necessary”.
Hubbard was sentenced to almost seven years in a penal colony in 2024. He was accused of serving in a defence unit in Izyum, eastern Ukraine, when he was captured by Russian forces shortly after Moscow’s full-scale invasion in 2022.
Writing on social media after Russian state media reported the release, Trump said it had followed a request he “made directly” to Putin last week.
Some other releases of detained Americans from Russia have been obtained through prisoner swaps.
Trump also appeared to defend his recent decision to suspend sanctions on Russia two days before they were due to come into force, writing that “if sanctions would have been placed”, negotiations for Hubbard’s release “would have come to a complete and total halt”.
The US state department had previously classified Hubbard, from Michigan, as “wrongfully detained” and the US president had suggested on Tuesday that his release may be imminent.
“Watch what happens,” Trump told reporters, “we have been focused on Hubbard”.
CBS News, the BBC’s US media partner, reported that Hubbard had been in poor health and was expected to be flown to Texas for treatment.
Witkoff praised Putin for releasing Hubbard: “You talk so much about my president, President Trump, being a humanitarian – you are a humanitarian also sir, and I salute that. I commend you.”
Hubbard was later seen thanking Witkoff as they met separately. Putin’s financial adviser Kirill Dmitriev was also present.
Witkoff, who had attended talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Oslo the previous day, also asked Putin to consider a number of proposals agreed in the Norwegian capital, including renewing trilateral peace talks with Ukraine to try to end the war.
Putin has not publicly commented on whether any of the proposals would be acceptable for Moscow.
The Russian leader has so far rejected all proposals from Ukraine and its European allies to freeze the vast front line as it is and start peace talks.
He thanked Putin for the deal struck with Washington earlier this month to import Russian diesel, saying Trump was “deeply grateful” for it.
The first shipment under the agreement will leave Russia “in two to three days”, Putin said during the meeting, as quoted by state news agency TASS.
The diesel deal infuriated Zelensky and triggered a tumultuous few weeks of deteriorating relations during which Trump suspended a number of sanctions and said it was time for Ukraine to elect a new leader.
Ahead of the US midterm elections in November, Trump has also sought to blame fuel prices, which have risen since the start of the US-led war on Iran, on Ukrainian strikes against Russian energy sites.
Kyiv meanwhile accused Washington of halting intelligence sharing on deadly Russian strikes, causing Ukrainians to lose their lives – an allegation Washington rejected as “scandalous” – and claimed a sudden restriction to the Starshield internet service in its war effort had been deliberate.
The Ukrainian president said on Tuesday that intelligence sharing had resumed, following talks with Witkoff in Oslo described by a US official as “constructive”.
As talks were under way in St Petersburg, Zelensky wrote on social media that “much depends on whether the American side can hear something new from Russia today – about peace, and not about continuing the war”.
Russian state news agency Ria Novosti reported that the US and Russia discussed the outcome of the Oslo talks and that Witkoff had brought documents “outlining approaches to the peace process”.
They also discussed the “situation surrounding Iran”, a possible meeting in China, and economic cooperation with the US, with Putin reportedly stating that Russia could provide large quantities of fertiliser to the American market.
The talks in St Petersburg lasted about than three hours, Russia’s state-run media reported.
By BBC News
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