Case of Wall Street Journal reporter accused of espionage in Russia sent to court

By Elena Teslova

MOSCOW (AA) - Russian prosecutors on Thursday approved the espionage indictment of a Wall Street Journal journalist and sent the case to court.

"The Prosecutor General's Office has approved an indictment in the criminal case against US citizen Evan Gershkovich. He is accused of committing a crime under Article 276 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, espionage," Prosecutor General's Office spokesman Andrey Ivanov told reporters in Moscow.

The case was sent to the Sverdlovsk region court in Yekaterinburg, the administrative center of Sverdlovsk Oblast and the Ural Federal District, Russia.

Gershkovich was detained in Russia in March 2023 on charges of espionage.

The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) accused him of collecting state secrets about the military-industrial complex. Gershkovich and the Journal have denied the claims, insisting he was simply doing his job as a journalist.