FALSELY imprisoned Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich will remain in prison on espionage charges, a Russian court has ruled.
The 32-year-old U.S. citizen was cruelly detained in late March 2023 while on a reporting trip and has spent over a year behind bars without a trial.
APWall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich stands in a glass cage in a courtroom at the First Appeals Court of General Jurisdiction in Moscow[/caption]
Authorities have routinely extended his time behind bars and rejected his appeals.
His pretrial detention was continued yet again until June 30 in a ruling that he and his lawyers challenged.
In the courtroom on Tuesday, Gerhskovich, wearing a white T-shirt and an open checked shirt, looked relaxed, at times laughing and chatting with members of his legal team.
He gave a heroic thumbs up as he appeared behind a glass screen for his latest appeal to be rejected.
His arrest in the city of Yekaterinburg rattled journalists in Russia, where authorities have not detailed what if any, evidence they have to support the espionage charges.
Gershkovich and his employer have denied the allegations, and the U.S. government has declared him to be wrongfully detained.
Experts have pointed out that Moscow may be using jailed Americans as bargaining chips in soaring tensions with the U.S.
In December, the U.S. State Department said it had made a significant offer to secure the release of Gershkovich and Paul Whelan, another American imprisoned in Russia on espionage charges, which it said Moscow had rejected.
Officials did not describe the offer, although Russia has been said to be seeking the release of Vadim Krasikov, who was given a life sentence in Germany in 2021 for the killing in Berlin of Zelimkhan Tornike Khangoshvili.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, asked this year about releasing Gershkovich, appeared to refer to Krasikov by pointing to a man imprisoned by a U.S. ally for liquidating a bandit who had allegedly killed Russian soldiers during separatist fighting in Chechnya.
Kremlin crony Dmitry Peskov repeatedly said that while certain contacts on swaps continue, they must be carried out in absolute silence.
Gershkovich is the first American reporter to be arrested on espionage charges in Russia since September 1986.