AMERICAN JOURNALIST’S TRIAL SET FOR JUNE 26.

US journalist Evan Gersh kovich will go on trial on espionage charges in Russia’s Urals city of Yekaterinburg behind closed doors on June 26, the court overseeing the process said on Monday.

The Wall Street Journal reporter was arrested in March 2023 while on a reporting trip in Yekaterinburg and has been held in Moscow’s notorious Lefortovo prison since. He became the first Western journalist since the Soviet era to be arrested for spying in Russia. The United States said the charges had “zero credibility” and the Wall Street Journal slammed Russia’s announcement as “outrageous”.

Moscow had not previously provided any public details of its case against Gershkovich, saying only that he was “caught red-handed”. On Monday, the Sverdlovsk regional court handling the case said in a statement that the trial would start on June 26 and be held behind closed doors.

ATN recalls that Russian President Vladimir Putin said in February he would like to see Gershkovich freed as part of a prisoner exchange and that talks were ongoing. But Putin made clear he wanted any deal to involve the release of a Russian jailed in Germany for killing a Chechen dissident.

The Kremlin again said Monday there was “contact” with the US on a possible exchange involving Gershkovich.