The US State Department has classified Griner as wrongfully detained in Russia, and her case is being handled by the office of the US special presidential envoy for hostage affairs, a State Department official confirmed to CNN last week. The office leads and coordinates the government’s diplomatic efforts aimed at securing the release of Americans wrongfully detained abroad.<\/div>\n
In addition to work by the Biden administration, the Richardson Center, which privately advocates on behalf of families of hostages and detainees, is working on behalf of the Griner family to try to secure her release.<\/p>\n
The WNBA views federal authorities’ move to classify Griner as wrongfully detained as a “positive development and a next step to getting her home,” a league spokesperson said last week. <\/p>\n
Griner was the No. 1 pick in the 2013 WNBA draft and is one of the league’s all-time best players.<\/p>\n
The league, which started its 26th regular season last week without Griner, is honoring the seven-time all-star with her initials and jersey number (42) along the sidelines of all 12 home courts. Griner will also be paid her full WNBA salary, the league said.<\/div>\n
Last season, Griner finished second in Most Valuable Player Award voting. The 6-foot-9 center led the Mercury to the WNBA Finals, where Phoenix lost to the Chicago Sky. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n
.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Griner, who the US government has said is being wrongfully detained, will now be held at least until June 18, a court in Khimki outside Moscow ruled Friday, TASS reported, citing the court’s press service. Leaving a hearing Friday in the Khimki court, she was handcuffed, wearing an orange hooded pullover with her head down, …<\/p>\n
Brittney Griner’s detention in Russia has been extended by a month, Russian state news reports<\/span> Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14026,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[11],"tags":[8620,8621,19],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/cdn.cnn.com\/cnnnext\/dam\/assets\/220513134328-brittney-griner-court-051322-super-tease.jpg?ssl=1","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cdn.cnn.com\/cnnnext\/dam\/assets\/220513134328-brittney-griner-court-051322-super-tease.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14025"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14025"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14025\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14026"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}