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Powers is Freed by Soviet in an Exchange for Abel; U-2 Pilot on Way to U.S.

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TRANSFER IS MADE
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American Student is Also Released in East Germany
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By Tom Wicker
Special to The New York Times

Washington, Saturday, Feb. 10 -- Francis Gary Powers has been released by the Soviet Union in exchange for the release of Col. Rudolf Abel, the convicted Soviet spy, the White House announced at 3:20 A. M.

Frederic L. Pryor, an American student held by East German authorities since August, 1961, also has been released. He was turned over to the American authorities in Berlin.

Mr. Powers, the White House said, is in Berlin en route to the United States.

Colonel Abel was deported and has been released in Berlin.

Result of Long Effort

The White House announcement said that efforts to obtain Mr. Powers' release had been under way for some time. It added that the United States, in its recent efforts, had had the "cooperation and assistance" of James B. Donovan, a New York lawyer.

The announcement of the releases and the exchange with the Soviet Union was made by Pierre Salinger, the President's press secretary, at a White House news conference just after 3 A. M.

Mr. Powers was downed in a U-2 plane while making a high-altitude reconnaissance flight over the Soviet Union in May, 1960. At a Moscow trial later he pleaded guilty to espionage charges and was sentenced to ten years - three in prison and seven in a prison colony.

The U-2 incident occurred just before a Big Four summit meeting was to have taken place in Paris. After reaching Paris, Premier Khrushchev unloosed a barrage of diatribe against the United States and used the incident to disrupt the planned meeting.

Colonel Abel was convicted in the United States of espionage charges in 1957 and given a thirty-year sentence. This sentence has been commuted by President Kennedy.

Mr. Powers and Colonel Abel were exchanged in the middle of the Glienicker Bridge between Wansee and Potsdam. The border between East Germany and West Berlin runs through the middle of the bridge.

The exchange was carried out at 2:52 A. M. today, Eastern Standard Time. That was 8:52 A. M. in Berlin.

Mr. Pryor was released at the Friederichstrasse checkpoint just before the two others were exchanged.

President Kennedy was notified about 3 A. M. that the exchange had been completed. He knew it was under way, and was awaiting word from Berlin.

Government officials said they could give no details about the movements of Mr. Power before the exchange. He had been in prison in Moscow.

They said, however, that they expected him to be on his way to the United States in a short time.

Members of the Powers family were notified of the flier's release about five minutes before the White House announcement.

Deal Studied Since 1960

The possible exchange of Mr. Powers for Colonel Abel had been speculated upon almost from the day of the U-2 pilot's conviction in Moscow Aug. 19, 1960.

There also was considerable discussion of the way the two men conducted themselves from the time of their arrests to their imprisonment.

In the Powers case, the United States admitted that the U-2 flight was for espionage. The Eisenhower Administration termed such actions a necessity.

Nothing but silence surrounded the Abel case. Neither Colonel Abel nor the Soviet Government said a word about the espionage.

Colonel Abel was arrested at a Manhattan hotel on June 21, 1957. He had been posing as an artist with a studio in Brooklyn Heights.

In the studio, Federal agents found a hollow pencil used for concealing messages, a wooden block with microfilm and a code book.

Colonel Abel was convicted in 1957 and sentenced to a thirty-year prison term. He had been at the Federal penitentiary in Atlanta, Ga.

Oliver Powers, the U-2 pilot's father, had asked for such an exchange before the trial of his son opened in Moscow.

The U-2 pilot's release came little more than a year after Moscow's freeing of two surviving crew members of the United States RB-47 reconnaissance plane shot down off the Soviet Union on July 1, 1960.

Mr. Kennedy's announcement of the RB-47 survivors' release was made in a dramatic televised news conference on Jan. 25, 1961, his first in office.

The two survivors are Capt. John R. McCone of Tonganoxie, Kan., and Capt. Freeman B. Olmstead of Elmira, N.Y.

Mr. Donovan was the court-appointed lawyer who defended Colonel Abel in his 1957 espionage trial in New York.

The Soviet officer appealed his conviction to the United States Supreme Court on the grounds that some of the evidence used against him was seized unconstitutionally by Federal agents.

On March 28, 1960, the Supreme Court rejected the appeal.

Colonel Abel was the highest ranking Soviet officer ever tried on espionage charges in the United States.

He was specifically charged with conspiring to pass defense and nuclear secrets to the Kremlin - a charge that could have brought the death penalty.

However, Mr. Donovan argued that the Russian might someday be exchanged for some American being held behind the Iron Curtain.

Two and a half years later, Mr. Powers was down over the Soviet Union.

The Russians claimed that they knocked down the high-altitude jet with rockets. The crash site was 1,300 miles inside the Soviet Union, near the industrial center of Sverdiovsk.

Mr. Powers' father, Oliver, said at his home in Pound, Va., that the news of his son's release came as a "complete surprise."

"I'm very glad," he said.

The elder Mr. Powers said he had thought his son would have to spend seven or eight years, at least, in a Soviet prison.

The father, who attended his son's Moscow trial, at first refused to believe he was on the way home.

"Are you sure this is true?" he asked repeatedly.

Mrs. Powers also expressed joy at the news.

"I'm sure thankful, really thankful, if its true," she said.

Daie Gefangenen wurden doch an Checkpoint Charlie übergeben, oder?

"Mr. Powers and Colonel Abel were exchanged in the middle of the Glienicker Bridge between Wansee and Potsdam . The border between East Germany and West Berlin runs through the middle of the bridge."