Wall Street Journal rejects 'false and unfounded' charges against a 32-year-old journalist who has been detained since March 2023.
Russian prosecutors have said that American journalist Evan Gershkovich will stand trial in the Ural city of Yekaterinburg, where he was detained more than a year ago after being accused of working for the CIA.
Gershkovich, 32, is accused of “gathering secret information” on the orders of the CIA about Uralvagonzavod, a facility that produces and repairs military equipment, the attorney general's office said in a statement, revealing details of the accusations for the first time in its against. . The statement did not give a date for the trial.
Gershkovich, a Wall Street Journal journalist, has been in prison since he was arrested in Yekaterinburg, about 1,400 kilometers (870 miles) east of Moscow, on March 29, 2023, and charged with espionage. He denies any wrongdoing.
Following the Russian announcement, the Journal said Gershkovich faced “a false and unfounded accusation.” A joint statement from Almar Latour, the newspaper's editor, and its editor-in-chief, Emma Tucker, demanded Gershkovich's immediate release.
“Russia's latest step toward a sham trial is, while expected, deeply disappointing and no less scandalous,” the statement said.
“Evan has spent 441 days unjustly detained in a Russian prison simply for doing his job. Evan is a journalist. “The Russian regime’s smear against Evan is disgusting, repugnant and based on calculated and transparent lies.”
The United States called Gershkovich “unjustly detained” in April 2023, and President Joe Biden called his detention “totally illegal.”
Latour and Tucker said they now expected the US government to step up its efforts to secure his release.
US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Washington would continue working to bring Gershkovich home.
“Evan has done nothing wrong. He should never have been arrested in the first place. “Journalism is not a crime,” Miller said. “The charges against him are false. And the Russian government knows they are false. He should be released immediately.”
Possible prisoner exchange
Gershkovich was the first American journalist to be arrested on espionage charges in Russia since the Cold War, when Moscow enacted increasingly repressive laws on free speech after sending troops to Ukraine. Washington has tried to negotiate his release, but Russia's Foreign Ministry said Moscow would consider a prisoner swap only after a verdict in his trial.
When asked by The Associated Press news agency last week about Gershkovich, Russian President Vladimir Putin said the United States was “taking strong measures” to secure the journalist's release. He told international news agencies in a rare news conference that such publications are “not decided through the media” but through a “discreet, calm and professional approach.”
“And certainly they should be decided only on the basis of reciprocity,” he added, alluding to a possible prisoner exchange.
Gershkovich faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
The Uralvagonzavod factory, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) north of Yekaterinburg, has been sanctioned by Western countries. Based in the city of Nizhny Tagil in the Sverdlovsk region, it plays a crucial role in supplying tanks for Moscow's war in Ukraine, according to the Russian Defense Ministry.
The factory, run by a state conglomerate controlled by one of Putin's allies, has publicly talked about producing T-90M battle tanks and modernizing T-72B3M tanks.
The number of tanks Russia has lost in battle in Ukraine is a military secret in Russia, which says it has increased tank production.
The London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies think tank said in February that Russia had lost more than 3,000 tanks – the equivalent of its entire active pre-war inventory – but had enough lower-quality armored vehicles in storage. for years of replacements.
