A Russian judge ruled Tuesday that American journalist Evan Gershkovich must remain behind bars on espionage charges in a case that is part of a Kremlin crackdown on dissent and press freedom amid the war in Ukraine.
Appearing in public for the first time in weeks, the 31-year-old Wall Street Journal reporter stood in a defendant’s glass cage in Moscow City Court, wearing blue jeans and a navy blue gingham checked shirt. He paced at times with his arms folded, talking through an opening with his lawyers and occasionally smiling as he acknowledged the other journalists crammed into the courtroom.
Gershkovich is the first U.S. correspondent since the Cold War to be detained in Russia on spying charges, and his arrest rattled journalists in the country and drew outrage in the West. Gershkovich, his employer and the U.S. government deny he was involved in spying and have demanded his release.
“Evan is a member of the free press who right up until he was arrested was engaged in newsgathering. Any suggestions otherwise are false,” the Journal has said. Last week, the U.S. officially declared that Gershkovich was “wrongfully detained.”
Russia’s Federal Security Service arrested Gershkovich in the Ural Mountains city of Yekaterinburg on March 29 and accused him of trying to obtain classified information about a Russian arms factory.
