White House warns freeing Evan Gershkovich ‘potentially tough’

US continues to seek release of WSJ reporter, as well as businessman Paul Whelan, from Russia as challenges mount, John Kirby says.

Evan Gershkovich appears in Moscow City Court this week. Picture: AFP

The White House said the U.S. is in “very active” discussions aimed at securing the release of jailed Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, but warned that freeing him could be difficult.

“I can tell you there’s not a single day since Evan has been incarcerated that we haven’t worked on that case,” John Kirby, the National Security Council’s coordinator for strategic communications, said during an interview with MSNBC on Wednesday. He added that the US is also working to free American businessman Paul Whelan, who was sentenced to 16 years in a Russian high-security prison on an espionage charge in 2020.

Gershkovich, a 31-year-old American citizen who was accredited by Russia’s Foreign Ministry to work as a journalist, was detained by agents from the Federal Security Service on March 29 during a reporting trip. He is being held on an allegation of espionage that he, the Journal and the US government vehemently deny. Washington has said Gershkovich isn’t a spy, has never worked for the government and has deemed him to be wrongfully detained.

Whelan denies the charge against him, and the US government has also deemed him to be wrongfully detained. The designation for both men unlocked a broad US government effort to exert pressure on Russia to free them.

Kirby said the fact that Gershkovich and Whelan are charged with espionage is complicating efforts to release them. “Because it’s espionage, the Russians sort of treat them differently. So it’s going to be, you know, could be potentially tough to continue to work to get them back,” he said. Kirby declined to provide additional details about the behind-the-scenes discussions.

A Moscow city court on Tuesday declined to consider Gershkovich’s latest appeal against his pretrial detention, citing procedural irregularities, according to the court’s website. The appeal was withdrawn from consideration, the court said. It didn’t specify the nature of the procedural violations, but said the irregularities were to be addressed. It couldn’t be determined where the irregularities originated.

Gershkovich appeared in court, wearing a sweatshirt and jeans. He appeared relaxed and smiled as he stood in the glass defendants’ box before the start of the court session.

Gershkovich’s initial pretrial detention was scheduled to expire on May 29, but has since been extended until November 30. His lawyers last month appealed this latest extension of his detention.

In a statement Tuesday, the Journal said it was aware that Gershkovich’s appeal was “returned to the lower court and no ruling was made.” It emphasized that the reporter had done nothing wrong.

The Wall Street Journal