Russian court extends the detention of a Russian-US journalist

MOSCOW — A Russian court on Friday ordered a detained Russian-American journalist to be detained until at least August 5, pending investigation and trial, a further step in the Kremlin’s crackdown on dissent and free speech.

Alsou Kurmasheva, editor of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Tatar-Bashkir service, funded by the US government, was detained on October 18 and charged with failing to register as a foreign agent while collecting information on the Russian military. Later, she was also accused of spreading “false information” about the military.

A Tatarstan court on Friday ordered him to remain behind bars until at least August 5, according to OVD-Info, a Russian human rights group that tracks political arrests.

Kurmasheva, who has dual American and Russian citizenship and lives in Prague with her husband and two daughters, could face up to 10 years in prison if convicted, according to RFE/RL.

Russian authorities have intensified a crackdown on Kremlin critics and independent journalists after President Vladimir Putin sent troops to Ukraine in February 2022, using legislation that effectively criminalized any public expression about the conflict that deviated from the Kremlin line.

Kurmasheva was the second American journalist detained in Russia last year, after Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was arrested on espionage charges in March. Gershkovich and his employer rejected the charges, and U.S. authorities declared him wrongfully detained. He has spent a year in detention.

Kurmasheva was initially detained on June 2 as she left Kazan International Airport after traveling to Russia the previous month to visit her sick mother. Officials confiscated Kurmasheva’s U.S. and Russian passports and fined her for failing to register her U.S. passport. She was waiting for her documents to be returned when she was arrested on other charges in October. RFE/RL has called for her release.

Russian authorities ordered RFE/RL in 2017 to register as a foreign agent, but it has challenged Moscow’s use of foreign agent laws before the European Court of Human Rights. Russia has fined the organization millions of dollars.