for many years he's had a close relationship with russia in the sense that he has been traveling for business and pleasure for the past 12 or 13 years, it seems. over that time he accumulated contacts on his social media page, 70 of them at least, and many of them seem to be members or former members of the russian military, the russian security, and that may have been one of the things that highlighted his presence to the russian security services. there has been this consulate visit finally that took place being led by jon huntsman, the u.s. ambassador to russia, and he said he visited mr. whelan at the detention facility that is a former kgb prison on the outskirts of miscellaneooscow, called the whelan family and spoke to them about mr. whelan's