They are prevented from talking about the settlement. That much we can agree with. I believe I even posted that part of the CBA in here.
However, The CBA explicitly says they can not terminate a contract, even mutually without unconditional waivers. The only time that can happen is when a player has a NMC and the player decides to forego the waivers.
Again, I asked someone in the know and
@Gee Wally probably knows who that says "the NHL makes up the rules as they go along."
We can also agree something fishy went on behind the scenes here.
My uneducated guess is: We have a very talented hockey player who probably would have been the Bruins second best prospect that did some atrocious things. Someone drastically underestimated the backlash it would cause. They went ahead and it bit them in the ass and someone had to bail them out.