The Kremlin rejects information about a possible exchange of Sentsov for Russian prisoners in the United States

Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov rejected reports that Ukrainian director Oleg Sentsov could be released in exchange for three Russian prisoners in the United States.

“I don’t know where this information came from and what it is based on,” Peskov told a journalist from the Dozhd TV channel.

The day before, Novaya Gazeta reported that Sentsov could be exchanged for the Russians Viktor Bout, Konstantin Yaroshenko and Maria Butina. A source close to the negotiations between Russia and Ukraine said that Moscow is ready to discuss this topic with Washington without the participation of Kyiv.

The news was commented by Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova and Oleg Sentsov's lawyer Dmitry Dinze, both of whom said they had not heard of such proposals.

Oleg Sentsov was sentenced in Russia to 20 years in prison on charges of plotting terrorist attacks in Crimea. Since May 14, he has been on a hunger strike demanding the release of all Ukrainian political prisoners from Russian prisons. Now Sentsov is in the hospital.

Viktor Bout, for whom, according to Novaya Gazeta, Sentsov can be exchanged, received 25 years in prison in the United States in 2012 for training in the sale of weapons to Colombian terrorists. Pilot Konstantin Yaroshenko was sentenced to 20 years in 2011 on charges of smuggling cocaine. Maria Butina was detained in Washington in July, accusing her of working as a foreign agent without registration and ties to Russian intelligence.