The parents of US ballerina Ksenia Karelina have thanked President Trump after she was released from a Russian penal colony following a prisoner exchange with Vladimir Putin’s security service.
Karelina, 34, a Russian-born dancer who worked in a Los Angeles spa, was arrested in her home city of Yekaterinburg in February 2024 after she was accused of collecting donations for the Ukrainian army.
“A big thank you from the bottom of my heart to President Trump and to President Putin, because I guess that deal must have involved them both,” Karelina’s father, Pavel, a 56-year-old service company director, told the Wall Street Journal.
Freed American ballerina Ksenia Karelina (right) has been released from a Russian jail. @aboehler/X“We are beside ourselves with happiness. The first seconds of our chat were all pure emotions, I can’t even remember what we were saying, it was like one explosion of happiness,” he went on.
Karelina was released early Thursday as part of a US-Russia prisoner swap in Abu Dhabi.
A dual Russian-American citizen, Karelina was jailed for 12 years last August after a Russian court found her guilty of treason.
She donated just over $50 to Razom, a New York-based charity supporting Ukraine in its war with her birth nation.
The US has maintained that she was wrongfully detained in February last year while visiting family, after Vladimir Putin’s security service the FSB found the donations on her phone.
Ksenia’s father, Pavel (left), thanked President Trump for securing his daughter’s release. Ksenia Karelina / FacebookThe US released German-Russian citizen Arthur Petrov in exchange for Karelina.
Petrov was arrested in Cyprus in 2023 for allegedly exporting sensitive American technology.
He was accused of using a Cypriot company to buy the microelectronics for supposed fire security systems before shipping them instead to a St. Petersburg-based Russian military supplier.
Russian-born Karelina was arrested in February last year on a visit to her home city of Yekaterinburg. via REUTERSPetrov had not been sentenced.
Karelina’s release has been hailed as a propaganda coup by the Trump administration.
President Trump secured Karelina’s release as part of a prisoner swap deal. REUTERS
Karelina has joint Russian and American citizenship and works in Los Angeles. K Karelina/e2w“Today, the United States welcomes the return of American-Russian ballerina Ksenia Karelina who was sentenced by a Russian court to a penal colony for 12 years after authorities discovered she had donated to a Ukrainian charity,” Trump’s national security adviser Mike Waltz wrote in a post on X.
“President Trump and his administration continue to work around the clock to ensure Americans detained abroad are returned home to their families,” he added.
Karelina’s release was secured through the help of the United Arab Emirates. @HSajwanization
Karelina was sentenced to 12 years in a brutal penal colony last August. STRINGER/EPA-EFE / ShutterstockA sweet picture of Karelina returning home to the US on a plane holding an American flag was shared by Adam Boehler, Trump’s special government employee for hostage negotiations, in a post on X.
“Ksenia, a beautiful ballerina held for over a year in Russia is on our American plane en route home!” Boehler wrote. “Thank you Donald Trump! And the A team, Steve Witkoff, Marco Rubio, John Ratcliffe and Mike Waltz.”
