Russian authorities on Thursday formally charged Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty journalist Alsu Kurmasheva with violating the country’s “foreign agent” law.

Russia’s Investigative Committee announced that Kurmasheva has been charged under a section of the Criminal Code that refers to the registration of foreign agents who engage in “purposeful collection of information in the field of military, military-technical activities of Russia,” VOA’s sister outlet RFE/RL reported. 

The Investigative Committee said she did not provide documents to be included on the registry. 

Kurmasheva denies the charge, according to RFE/RL. 

Based in Prague, Kurmasheva is an editor for RFE/RL’s Tatar-Bashkir Service. A dual U.S.-Russian national, she traveled to Russia in May for a family emergency. She was briefly detained in June while waiting for her return flight, and her passports were confiscated. 

She was waiting for her passports to be returned when she was detained on October 18. A Russian court on October 23 ordered her held in pretrial detention until December 5. Kurmasheva faces up to five years in prison.

Press freedom groups, the United Nations Human Rights Office and the U.S. government have condemned Kurmasheva’s detention and called for her immediate release. 

“It is highly disturbing that the authorities took advantage of an urgent trip home for family reasons to detain a journalist who is normally based outside the country precisely to avoid arbitrary arrest,” Scott Griffen, deputy director of the International Press Institute, said in a statement Thursday.

“We demand Kurmasheva’s immediate release, as well as that of all other Russian journalists held behind bars,” Griffen added. 

Russia’s Washington Embassy did not immediately reply to VOA’s email requesting comment. 

Russia has a long history of jailing critical journalists and activists. The country held at least 19 journalists in prison as of late 2022, when the Committee to Protect Journalists conducted its most recent annual prison census.

Kurmasheva is one of two American journalists currently jailed in Russia. 

Russian authorities arrested American Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich in March on espionage charges that he, his employer and the U.S. government vehemently deny. 

Thursday marks Gershkovich’s 32nd birthday, which he spent behind bars in Moscow’s notorious Lefortovo Prison. 

“Every single day he’s detained is a day too long,” his sister, Danielle Gershkovich, told VOA earlier this week.

Most recently, Gershkovich’s pretrial detention was extended until at least November 30. It was originally set to expire in May. 

Meanwhile, also on Thursday, Marina Ovsyannikova, a former Russian state TV journalist who famously interrupted a live broadcast to protest the war in Ukraine and now lives in exile in France, lost custody of her children in a court battle with her ex-husband, who leads the Spanish bureau of the Russian state news outlet RT. 

“I hope my children will be proud of me someday,” she wrote on the Telegram messaging app on Thursday, condemning the court’s ruling. 

Earlier this month, a Russian court sentenced Ovsyannikova in absentia to eight-and-a-half years in prison for staging a separate protest outside the Kremlin in July 2022.

Ovsyannikova fled Russia last year with her 11-year-old daughter, but her 14-year-old son remains with his father, Igor Ovsyannikov. 

Earlier this week, the Moldovan government blocked access to over 20 Russian news outlets, saying they were used as part of an information war against the former Soviet state. 

Russia condemned the move as a “hostile step.”

Moldova previously restricted TV broadcasts of Russia-produced news in June 2022 after Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine earlier that year, instead only permitting entertainment shows and movies. 

Moldovan President Maia Sandu has accused the Kremlin of plotting a coup and trying to destabilize the government. 
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