Nearly 100 whales held in an infamous “whale jail” in Russia's far east have begun to be freed, state television announced during a call-in show with Vladimir Putin on Thursday.

Two Orcas and six Belugas have been loaded onto lorries and will be released further north in the Sea of Okhotsk, where they were captured last year.

The problem was “not easy to solve” since the Orcas alone were worth $100 million and there were many potential buyers, Mr Putin said.

“Wherever there's big money there are always difficulties with solutions, but thank God the process has begun,” he said.

In addition, Russia will clamp down on the capture of whales, a deputy prime minister told Mr Putin during the call-in show, which is carefully choreographed to show the president solving issues for ordinary Russians.

The whales' impending release marks the conclusion of a saga that began when media revealed in November that 11 Orcas and 90 Beluga whales were being held in small enclosures in a bay near Nakhodka on the Pacific coast.