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UN panel joins chorus calling for release of Evan Gershkovich

Russia arbitrarily arrested Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich to punish him for his reporting on the war in Ukraine, a United Nations commission said in a statement released Tuesday. The statement is the latest in a series of public condemnations of his continued imprisonment.

In his rackadopted in March but released on Tuesday, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention said Mr Gershkovich, who appeared in a secret court hearing last week to answer espionage charges he denies, should be released immediately.

“Mr. Gershkovich’s arrest was carried out under the pretext of espionage, but in fact was intended to punish his reporting on the armed conflict” between Russia and Ukraine, the group said. The group said it had asked Russia to “clarify the legal provisions justifying Mr. Gershkovich’s detention,” but had received no response.

In a statement, Almar Latour, publisher of The Wall Street Journal, said the group’s opinion recognizes that “Russia is violating international law by imprisoning Evan for his journalism.”

The working group, consisting of of legal scholars and lawyers, said Russia had failed to provide “factual or legal support” for the espionage allegations against Mr. Gershkovich and that its legal team had been “deprived of the ability to coordinate, strategize and advise Mr. Gershkovich regarding his rights under international law.”

It was also noted that Russia had failed to provide sufficient reasons to justify the decision to hear Mr Gershkovich’s case behind closed doors and that Russia had restricted his rights to consular assistance.

The group has no power to force Russia to abide by its conclusions, and Russian authorities have not commented on its findings. On Tuesday, the Yekaterinburg court hearing the case against Mr Gershkovich said An appeal had been lodged against the decision to extend his pre-trial detention until December 13 this year.

Mr. Gershkovich, his employer and the U.S. government have denied the charges against him. The State Department has appointed Mr. Gershkovich as “wrongfully detained,” effectively forcing it to work toward his safe release. The Wall Street Journal called the accusations are “false and unfounded” and his trial a “sham.”

Without providing any evidence to support their claims, Russian prosecutors on June 13 accused Mr. Gershkovich, 32, of “using elaborate methods of conspiracy” to gather secret information at the behest of the CIA about the work of a major Russian factory in the Urals, east of Moscow, that produces tanks and other weapons. If found guilty, he could face up to 20 years in prison.

The Russian Federal Security Service, the country’s most powerful security agency, said in March 2023 that Mr Gershkovich was being held while receiving classified information. Shortly after his arrest in the industrial city of Yekaterinburg, about 850 miles east of Moscow, the Kremlin said Mr Gershkovich had been caught “red-handed”.

Mr. Gershkovich is one of several American citizens detained in Russia in recent years, and his case has raised fears that the Kremlin is seeking to use American citizens as bargaining chips to swap for Russians held in the West. Russian authorities have made no secret of the fact that the most likely way for Mr. Gershkovich to escape Russian custody would be through a prisoner swap with the United States after his case is resolved.

In its findings, the UN working group noted that the facts of the case against Mr. Gershkovich and “the pattern of political hostage-taking by the Russian Federation” made it clear that Russia “detained Mr. Gershkovich on the basis of his nationality and citizenship.”

Other Americans held in Russia include Paul Whelan, a US Navy veteran; Alsu Kurmasheva, an editor working for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty; and Marc Fogel, an American teacher at the Anglo-American School in Moscow who was sentenced in 2022 to 14 years in a penal colony for drug trafficking.

Anatoly Kurmanayev contributed to the reporting.

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