Doha (AFP) - The detention of US journalist Evan Gershkovich in Russia has put a new strain on the workload of US hostage envoy Roger Carstens who even before the arrest said his office resembles a "hospital emergency room".
Gershkovich is one of a growing number of Western nationals seen as "pawns" in global political battles.
The US government's special envoy for hostage affairs told AFP the majority of people monitored by his office were detained under government orders.
"There used to be a lot of hostage cases, very few wrongful detainee cases, and that has shifted.I would say two-thirds of my cases are now wrongful detentions, nation-states taking people," Carstens said on the sidelines of a recent security conference in Doha.
Using Qatar and other intermediaries, the United States is seeking to free three dual nationals in Iran.
Two other Americans are held in Russia -- former marine Paul Whelan and language teacher Marc Fogel, though only Whelan is considered "wrongfully detained".
Despite Iran's release of two French nationals last week, it still has at least four other French detainees, described previously as "hostages".Britons, Germans and other Europeans are also detained there.
Carstens took up the post in 2020 and is the last State Department political appointee from Donald Trump's administration still serving under Joe Biden, a sign of the respect he has earned and the importance of the post.
The former special forces lieutenant colonel told the Global Security Forum that the United States changed its handling of hostages after what he called "failures", notably over the killing of Americans in Syria in 2014.
Four Americans, including journalist James Foley, were beheaded by the Islamic State group.Foley's mother, Diane, now runs a foundation in his name to campaign for detained Americans.
The United States was wrong not to negotiate in many cases, had failed to communicate with families and bring together different government agencies, Carstens said.
The United States set up the special envoy post in 2015, coordinating work across the government.
The Biden administration recently used a 2020 act on wrongful detentions for the first time to impose sanctions on Russian and Iranian security services and individuals, over their role in holding Americans.
The State Department has also added a D-list on its travel advisories naming countries where "wrongful detention" is a risk.
Russia, Iran, China, North Korea, Venezuela and Myanmar are on it -- along with the likes of Hong Kong and Macau as Chinese-controlled territories.
'Crying' with families
Carstens said 24 Americans had been released in the previous 24 months.
The Foley Foundation estimates there are still more than 50 Americans held in foreign prisons for varying reasons.The State Department did not give a "wrongfully detained" figure, citing the sensitivity of cases.Gershkovich is one however.
There are many "desperate" families, Diane Foley told the forum."We are finding with wrongful detainees, that they are being held longer and longer because captors make it very difficult to get them out."
Carstens said he spends up to four hours a day speaking with families of detainees.
"My office is like a hospital emergency room, it is 24/7 activity," he said.
"If someone calls at 10 at night on a Friday we don't have the option of saying, 'Call us Monday, I left work at five.' We are going to pick that phone up and if they want to cry for two and half hours -- and that has happened -- we are going to be crying there with them."
The envoy said his team has the power to discuss release deals.The office "has ability to go and talk to and negotiate with ISIS if they take an American," he told the forum.
Unlike some Western nations, however, the United States says it does not pay ransom, believing that would incentivise hostage-taking.
'Pawns' between powers
Vina Nadjibulla, an international relations professor at the University of British Columbia whose husband, Michael Kovrig, was one of two Canadians detained in China for more than 1,000 days, said Western countries must make greater use of negotiations to free what she called "pawns in international affairs".
"My own research shows that as we get deeper into the geopolitical competition and as we are in this new environment, I think wrongful detentions by state actors will continue to increase," she said.
Kovrig and Michael Spavor only left China in September 2021 on the day that Canada freed Chinese Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou, who had been wanted in the United States on fraud charges.
Nadjibulla said that some countries "weaponise their judiciary" for diplomatic gain and called Iran "a perpetual offender"."They essentially have a whole enterprise around this."
