Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman on Americans held hostage abroad

More Americans are currently being held hostage by foreign governments than by terrorist groups. Join Washington Post global opinions writer Jason Rezaian in conversation with Deputy Secretary of State Wendy R. Sherman about wrongful detentions around the world and efforts to bring American hostages home.

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Highlights

“I’m sure that the President’s meeting today with the Whelans and with Griner’s wife will just be heartbreaking because you want to do everything you can to get Americans home. And then you want to work as hard as you can to really establish a norm around the world and an imperative that countries not use this tool. It is really not a tool, it is a horror show.” – Wendy R. Sherman (Video: Washington Post Live)

“We have a D indicator if in fact a country is using the unjust detention of Americans as leverage, economic leverage, geopolitical leverage. Those countries that current have a D indicator are Burma, the People’s Republic of China, Iran, North Korea, Russia and Venezuela.” – Wendy R. Sherman (Video: Washington Post Live)

“It’s a horrible fate to be an American detained abroad completely unjustly without the opportunity or the resources to properly defend yourself. In my case, I was being held in Iran with the entire Islamic republic’s resources being weaponized against me. Their judiciary, their foreign ministry when they would come to speak in public about their ongoing negotiations with the United States would throw me deeper into the ditch I was already in.” – Wendy R. Sherman (Video: Washington Post Live)

“We really have to work all over the globe to say that this is not a tool that governments should use. That human beings are not bargaining chips and should not be unjustly detained in these ways.. The hardest thing I do is meeting with families… These are just brutal meetings because the pain is so deep and so difficult.” – Wendy R. Sherman (Video: Washington Post Live)