Russia locks up a second journalist on trumped-up charges

The dual American-Russian citizen was convicted of spreading false information about Russia’s military.

Alsu Kurmasheva at a court hearing in Kazan, Russia, in April. Picture: AFP

A Russian court has sentenced Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, a dual US-Russian citizen, to 6½ years in prison after convicting her in a closed-door trial of disseminating false information about the Russian military.

The court’s verdict, reached on Friday following a secret trial but not reported by Russian state media until Monday night, came the same day as Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was wrongfully convicted by Russian authorities of spying and sentenced to 16 years in a high-security penal colony.

Gershkovich too was tried in secret, although representatives from the media heard the verdict. No one from the media was present to hear the court’s verdict on Kurmasheva, according to a spokeswoman for the Supreme Court of Tatarstan, where the trial took place.

Russian authorities produced no public evidence to support their allegations against Gershkovich, which he, the Journal and the US government have vehemently and repeatedly denied.

Kurmasheva has denied the charges against her through her lawyer and family. RFE/RL and Kurmasheva’s family say Russian authorities targeted the mother of two because of her US citizenship and because she is a journalist. Top US officials have called for Kurmasheva’s release.

“This secret trial and conviction make a mockery of justice – the only just outcome is for Alsu to be immediately released from prison by her Russian captors,” RFE/RL president and chief executive Stephen Capus said.

“It’s beyond time for this American citizen, our dear colleague, to be reunited with her loving family.”

Kurmasheva’s husband, Pavel Butorin, said in a post on X that he and his daughters “know Alsu has done nothing wrong. And the world knows it too. We need her home.”

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has denied Russia targets Americans. He said Russia takes appropriate measures against those who violate the law.

Kurmasheva, an editor for the Prague-based news organisation, was trying to leave Russia in June of last year after a two-week trip visiting her ailing mother in Kazan in the country’s southwest, when authorities confiscated her Russian and American passports and accused her of failing to properly register her US citizenship.

Then in October, Kurmasheva was arrested and placed in pretrial detention on a more serious charge – failing to register as a “foreign agent” – which carries a ­potential prison sentence of five years. In December, Russian authorities opened a new criminal case against her over a book she helped edit that criticises the invasion of Ukraine. They later charged her with spreading false information about Russia’s military, a crime with a sentence of up to 15 years.

The 47-year-old’s family and employer say Moscow is particularly hostile to RFE/RL, including the Tatar-Bashkir minority language service, where Kurmasheva is an editor based in Prague.

The Tatar-Bashkir service was designated as a foreign agent by Russian authorities in 2017, along with seven other RFE/RL news services.

Kurmasheva’s supporters have campaigned for months for the US State Department to designate her as wrongfully detained, which would commit the government to working toward her freedom. Only two Americans have been designated as wrongfully detained in Russia: Gershkovich and Paul Whelan, a former Marine serving 16 years on espionage charges he, his family and the US government say are bogus.

Gershkovich, 32, has been imprisoned since March of last year, when he was detained by the country’s Federal Security Service while on a reporting assignment in Yekaterinburg, about 1450km east of Moscow. He was accredited as a journalist by Russia’s Foreign Ministry at the time.

US officials say that there are instances when applying the wrongfully detained label could inadvertently hinder the resolution of a case by escalating it.

The US has previously brought Americans home who weren’t considered to be wrongfully detained, alongside Americans who were.

The Wall Street Journal