A Moscow court said Thursday that it would hear an appeal from the lawyers of Evan Gershkovich, the jailed Wall Street Journal reporter who was detained last week and accused of spying.
Mr. Gershkovich’s lawyers are challenging his detention on allegations of espionage, which the Journal vehemently denies. The Moscow City Court said it would hear the appeal April 18.
The court could uphold Mr. Gershkovich’s continued detention in Moscow’s Lefortovo prison, order him moved to another jail, allow him house arrest or grant him bail. A spokeswoman for the Journal declined to comment on any specific requests Mr. Gershkovich’s lawyers made regarding his detention.
A spokeswoman for the court said that, by law, its final decision must be communicated in public, but that the proceedings can take place behind closed doors.
The court said it was still unclear whether Mr. Gershkovich would appear at the hearing in person or via video link.
The U.S. government has called for Mr. Gershkovich’s immediate release, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that he had “no doubt” that the journalist had been wrongfully detained. The government has said Mr. Gershkovich isn’t a spy.
Moscow City Court said it was still unclear whether Evan Gershkovich would appear at the hearing in person or via video link.
Photo: yuri kochetkov/ShutterstockOn Thursday, Russia’s Foreign Ministry said its deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, discussed Mr. Gershkovich’s case with U.S. Ambassador to Russia Lynne Tracy, after she raised the issue.
The Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the charges against Mr. Gershkovich were of a serious nature, and it alleged that “he was caught red-handed while trying to obtain classified information, using his journalistic status as a cover for illegal actions qualifying as espionage.”
The Foreign Ministry also said Ms. Tracy was told that the “hype around this case, which is being fanned in the United States, with the aim of putting pressure on the Russian authorities and the court…is hopeless and senseless.”
A spokeswoman for the U.S. State Department confirmed the meeting took place but said that in general it doesn’t comment on diplomatic talks.
Also Wednesday, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau joined President Biden’s call to release Mr. Gershkovich, the latest national leader to raise objections to the arrest of the journalist.
Mr. Trudeau spoke to Mr. Biden “about Russia’s illegal detention of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and called for his immediate release,” his office said.
Authorities in Russia detained Mr. Gershkovich during a reporting trip to the Urals city of Yekaterinburg on March 29. Mr. Gershkovich was accredited by the Russian Foreign Ministry to work as a journalist in the country at the time.
The Journal has said his arrest “should spur outrage in all free people and governments throughout the world. No reporter should ever be detained for simply doing their job.”
Russia has said that it is acting in accordance with its own laws.
Lawyers engaged by the Journal were expected to visit Mr. Gershkovich on Thursday, for the second time since his detention.
Representatives from the U.S. Embassy in Moscow haven’t yet been able to visit Mr. Gershkovich and might not be permitted to for several more days, U.S. officials said. Russia “has an opaque and highly bureaucratic process for consular access,” a spokeswoman for the State Department said.
“It’s inexcusable. We need to get consular access to Evan,” National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby said Thursday of the delay.
He declined to say whether or when the U.S. would consider a prisoner swap to secure Mr. Gershkovich’s release. “We’re doing what we can to keep his employer and family informed. Our focus is squarely on that right now,” he said.
Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair Bob Menendez (D., N.J.) said in a statement Thursday that Russia must comply with the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. “It is outrageous that they have denied the State Department one of the most basic tenets of this international treaty,” the senator said. “There is no excuse for failing to provide such access eight days into Mr. Gershkovich’s detention.”
Mr. Menendez also urged the Biden administration to render an official determination transferring control of the State Department’s response to Mr. Gershkovich’s arrest to the Office of the Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs. He said such a determination would help provide resources and support to Mr. Gershkovich and his family. An official designation would rev up the U.S. government’s efforts to win Mr. Gershkovich’s release.
On Wednesday, Russia’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, said Russia would allow U.S. consular access in due course under standard Russian procedures.
“This issue is being worked out and will be resolved taking into account the existing consular practices and our legislation,” she told reporters at a briefing.
A spokeswoman for the Journal declined to comment Thursday on whether Mr. Gershkovich had received further legal visits or any consular visits.
In an interview with CNN on Thursday, former Vice President Mike Pence called on the Biden administration to expel Russian diplomats from the U.S. European governments and the chief of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization have denounced the reporter’s arrest.
Last week, more than 30 global media organizations and press freedom groups sent a letter coordinated by the Committee to Protect Journalists to Anatoly Antonov, the Russian ambassador to the U.S., calling for Mr. Gershkovich’s immediate release.
Ms. Zakharova said Wednesday that Moscow would disregard the letter, given that Western media hadn’t shown similar empathy for Maxim Fomin, a prominent pro-Kremlin war blogger who was killed Sunday in a bomb attack in St. Petersburg.
Russian authorities on Monday opened an investigation into what they called a terrorist attack and arrested a suspect in the killing of Mr. Fomin, who was better known by his pseudonym Vladlen Tatarsky.
Darya Trepova, a 26-year-old woman who had joined antiwar rallies, is being held on charges of carrying out the attack in a city center cafe where Mr. Fomin was giving a talk. More than three dozen people were injured, authorities said.
In a video published Monday by Russia’s Ministry of Internal Affairs, Ms. Trepova said she was detained for being at the scene of Mr. Fomin’s death. She admitted to carrying a figurine to the cafe that exploded. The Moscow court, where Ms. Trepova was arraigned, didn’t immediately respond to a request for a comment on her plea.
—Kate Vtorygina, Vivian Salama and Lindsay Wise contributed to this article.
Write to Ann M. Simmons at ann.simmons@wsj.com
Evan Gershkovich Detained in Russia
Latest news about the Wall Street Journal correspondent who was detained by the FSB for alleged espionage, an allegation the Journal vehemently denies
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Appeared in the April 7, 2023, print edition as 'Moscow Court to Hear Reporter’s Appeal.'
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