American journalist Evan Gershkovich has reached the first anniversary of his detention in a Russian prison, while people around the world have demonstrated against his unjust arrest.
He Wall Street Journal The 32-year-old journalist was arrested on March 29, 2023, while on an informative trip to the city of Yekaterinburg, in the Ural Mountains, with the intention of covering the “Wagner” mercenary militia.
The FSB, Russia’s counterintelligence force, accused Gershkovich of collecting state defense secrets during his trip. While Russian officials said they caught him “red-handed,” no evidence has ever been released.
As the first American journalist to be accused of espionage since the Cold War, experts have blamed geopolitics and Putin’s ruthless approach as the reason for his detention, despite vehement denials from Gershkovich and the White House.
Evan Gershkovich, 32, was arrested one year ago Friday on a reporting trip. Since then he has been brought before a Russian court a dozen times, pictured at the Moscow City Court on December 14, 2023.
The Wall Street Journal reporter has been classified as ‘wrongfully detained’ by the White House since his arrest and spends 23 hours a day in his cell.
To commemorate the one-year anniversary of his arrest, the Wall Street Journal published a powerful blank page with the headline: “Your Story Should Be Here.”
The Wall Street Journal was praised for its powerful Friday morning cover, which featured a blank space with the headline: “Your story should be here.”
‘A year in a Russian prison. A year of stolen stories, stolen joys, stolen memories. The crime: journalism,” said the subtitle.
In his year behind bars, Gershkovich has been brought before a Russian preliminary investigation court a dozen times, and each time his appeals were expectantly rejected and his detention extended.
At each visit, the 32-year-old’s friends and family can see him through court cameras, where he is often seen smiling defiantly.
Gershkovich’s mother, Ella Milman, a Jewish immigrant who settled in the United States from the Soviet Union in 1979, told the Associated Press that seeing her son locked up like that is “always a mixed feeling.”
“I’m happy to see him and that he’s okay, but it’s a reminder that he’s not with us.” We want him home,” she said. In a interview Marking the first anniversary on Friday, Milman said his situation “remains as painful as ever.”
His most recent appearance came on Tuesday, where a judge ordered him to remain in prison once again, this time until at least June 30.
The extensions are only until he is finally tried, where he faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted of espionage.
Gershkovich is often seen smiling wryly at his numerous court appearances before trial, where his arrest is routinely delayed. His family says seeing him occasionally is “always a mixed feeling.”
Evan’s parents, Ella Milman and Mikhail Gershkovich (pictured together), are Jewish immigrants who fled the Soviet Union to the United States in 1979, before meeting in Brooklyn.
Over the past year, tributes and messages of support have poured in for Gershkovich. President Biden is shown paying his respects at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner a month after his arrest in April 2023.
Gershkovich has been held at Lefortovsky Prison for a year, where he is confined to his cell and is entertained only by mail from family and friends, occasional reruns of Arsenal on television, and Russian history books from the prison library.
Gershkovich, an expert on Russian culture and history, moved to Russia in 2017 to work at The Moscow Times newspaper, before joining the Wall Street Journal in 2022.
Milman said he “absolutely loved” living in Russia and was, by all appearances, as safe as possible in the hostile nation as a journalist accredited to the Russian Foreign Ministry.
His arrest the following year came as a shock and caused confusion when the Journal was forced to hire a lawyer to locate him through the FSB.
His friend and colleague Eliot Brown, in a one-year tribute piece on Friday, wrote how the year since Gershkovich has been spent almost entirely in miserable conditions locked in his cell 23 hours a day.
He has a weekly meeting with his Russian lawyers, while one of his only forms of entertainment comes from letters from friends and family, including playing endless games of chess with his father by mail.
Russian history books and Dostoevsky tomes fill his days, and he occasionally watches replays of Arsenal, his favorite soccer team, on a small television next to his bed.
He told the Journal in a recent message that watching the Premier League team gives him “the same highs and lows as if he could watch the game live.”
“Spring arrived in Moscow and the boys gave me the happiest Wednesday morning: another opportunity to see them a little even from here,” he added.
Before his arrest, Brown wrote about how Gershkovich had recently moved a block from him in London and had vowed to enjoy a “year of sport” by attending Arsenal matches and joining a local club.
Russian officials have never released any evidence to support their claims that Gershkovich was guilty of espionage, and experts have seen his detention as a power play by Putin to use him as a pawn in geopolitical games.
The journalist’s appearances before a Russian court always provoke a multitude of cameras, as he is photographed standing defiantly at an appearance on September 19, 2023.
Gershkovich left Moscow for London shortly before the start of the Ukrainian war, and his sudden detention has since been conclusively seen as a power play by Putin to use the reporter as a pawn in his conflict and geopolitical games.
“It’s a way for the Kremlin to intimidate Western journalists still reporting in Russia,” said Jeanne Cavelier, head of Reporters Without Borders’ Eastern Europe and Central Asia Bureau. Time.
“If Western journalists can no longer report on Russia without being arrested and without being suspected and accused of espionage, the country may become an information black hole.”
His ongoing detention was even raised by former Fox News firebrand Tucker Carlson in his interview with Putin last month, where the Russian leader opposed the suggestion of releasing him and said the United States would have to show “good will”, indicating that he was seeking a prisoner exchange.
On the one-year anniversary Friday, President Joe Biden said the United States is working every day to secure his release.
“Journalism is not a crime, and Evan went to Russia to do his job as a reporter, risking his safety to shed light on Russia’s brutal aggression against Ukraine,” Biden said in a statement.
While he has sadly missed several birthdays and weddings (a friend posted a photo of Evan alongside his groomsmen at a recent wedding), those who know him said that may not bother him as much as his inability to cover up the craziness. Russian for last year.
“Yes, Evan is missing birthdays, New Years, parties and all the trips we had planned together,” his friend and Financial Times reporter Polina Ivanova told the Journal.
“But he’s also missing out on an opportunity to cover a crazy story… I know how tragic that is for him.”
His supporters, who face decades behind bars if convicted in an unjust Russian justice system, have not lost hope.
His friend and former college roommate, Jeremy Berke, said that when he officiates another friend’s wedding in June, they still dream he could be there.
“We have an invitation with your name on it,” he said. “We’re still hopeful he’ll be there.”