US reporter Evan Gershkovich’s trial in Russia begins after being charged with espionage

Fears are mounting as Russia begins a highly secretive trial, claiming the accused was caught “red handed”.

Russia has begun its closed-door trial of detained US reporter Evan Gershkovich, 15 months after he was arrested on espionage charges.

The case, held completely in private, has sent a chill through the US, as the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reporter continues to deny he is guilty of spying for the CIA during a March 2023 trip to Yekaterinburg.

Russia has shared no public evidence backing up the allegations after claiming they caught him “red-handed”.

If convicted, Gershkovich faces up to 20 years in a penal colony.

He was brought into court in the Urals city of Yekaterinburg this week, with Russian officials taking measures to shield details from the public.

The 32-year-old is the first journalist from the West to be arrested on spying charges in Russia since the Cold War and has become another incident on a growing list of disagreements between the US and Moscow.

Free press advocates across the globe have rallied for his release, but for now his fate is in the hands of Russia’s strict court system, which has a historic reputation of silencing dissenters.

While Russia has largely kept Gershkovich’s case in the shadows, reporters were treated to a glimpse in the city’s Sverdlovsk Regional Court on Wednesday. Gershkovich, now with a completely shaved head, was pictured smiling while standing in a glass enclosure before being hauled away for the private trial.

The Wall Street Journal smashed the Russian legal system this week, describing Gershkovich’s “sham trial” and calling for US officials to push for his immediate release.

Russia’s penitentiary service has refused to share details on where they are keeping Gershkovich before his next scheduled hearing on August 13.

Russia has begun its closed-door trial of detained US reporter Evan Gershkovich, 15 months after he was arrested on espionage charges.

Gershkovich has already spent almost 15 months in Moscow’s notorious Lefortovo prison since his arrest.

US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Wednesday that Moscow was holding Gershkovich as a “bargaining chip” to secure the release of Russians jailed abroad.

“Evan has never been employed by the United States government. Evan is not a spy. Journalism is not a crime, and Evan should never have been detained in the first place,” Kirby said.

US President Joe Biden has been put under immense pressure from the Gershkovich family to negotiate a deal with the Kremlin to return their son to America.

“Evan is a journalist, and journalism is not a crime. We urge the US government to continue to do everything possible to bring Evan home now,” his family said in a statement this week.

“It’s jarring to see him in yet another courtroom for a sham trial held in secret and based on fabricated accusations,” WSJ publisher Almar Latour and editor-in-chief Emma Tucker added in a statement, slamming the trial as “an unfathomable attack on the free press”.

Russia has shared no public evidence backing up the allegations after claiming they caught him ‘red-handed’.

The 32-year-old is the first journalist from the West to be arrested on spying charges in Russia since the Cold War and has become another incident on a growing list of disagreements between the US and Moscow.

The New York Times shared details of Gershkovich’s life behind bars over the past 15 months locked in Moscow’s Lefortovo prison. He has immersed himself in Russian literary classics like “War and Peace” and played slow-moving chess by mail with his father back home, according to correspondence with friends.

“He may have ups and downs like everyone else, but he remains confident in himself, in his rightness,” Maria Borzunova, a Russian journalist and a friend of Gershkovich, said via the publication.

In a statement on Wednesday, the US Embassy in Moscow said officials were at the courthouse and given brief access before the proceedings began, but the finer details of his wellbeing remain unclear.

Free press advocates across the globe have rallied for his release, but for now his fate is in the hands of Russia’s strict court system.

“We have been clear from the start that Evan has done nothing wrong and never should have been arrested in the first place,” the statement said.

There is now speculation Gershkovich has become a bargaining chip for Russia, as talk of a prisoner swap picks up speed.

“He’s a Kremlin chip, and they want to trade him,” Guardian reporter and a close friend of Gershkovich Pjotr Sauer said.

Asked in a television interview in February about Gershkovich’s fate, Putin admitted negotiations were underway, but he mentioned seeking further concessions.

He suggested that he might be willing to trade the reporter for Vadim Krasikov, a Russian sentenced to life in prison in Germany for the 2019 murder of a Chechen former separatist fighter in a downtown Berlin park.

Former US marine Paul Whelan, in prison in Russia since 2018 and serving a 16-year sentence on espionage charges, is also pushing to be included in any future prisoner exchange between the two superpowers.