FILE - Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich stands in a defendants cage in court in Moscow, Russia, on Oct. 10, 2023. Fifteen months after he was arrested in the city of Yekaterinburg on espionage charges, Gershkovich returns there for his trial starting Wednesday, June 26, 2024, behind closed doors. Gershkovich, his employer and the U.S. government deny the charges.
Paul Whelan, an American corporate security executive, was arrested in Moscow for espionage in 2018 and his serving a 16-year sentence. With Gerhkovich's trial being closed, few details of his case may become public. But the Russian Prosecutor General's office said this month that he is accused of “gathering secret information” on orders from the CIA about Uralvagonzavod, a plant about 150 kilometers north of Yekaterinburg that produces and repairs tanks and other military equipment.
“We had hoped to avoid this moment and now expect the U.S. government to redouble efforts to get Evan released,” they said. But that exchange also freed the highest-value Russian prisoner in the United States, arms dealer Viktor Bout, and the U.S. may not hold another card that strong. Putin has alluded to interest in freeing Vadim Krasikov, a Russian imprisoned in Germany for assassinating a Chechen rebel leader in Berlin, but Germany's willingness to aid in a Russia-U.S. dispute is uncertain.
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