U.S. journalist Evan Gershkovich, who has been jailed for over a year in Russia on espionage charges, will stand trial in the Ural Mountains city of Yekaterinburg, authorities said Thursday. An indictment of the Wall Street Journal reporter has been finalized and his case was filed to the Sverdlovsky Regional Court in the city about 870 miles east of Moscow, according to Russia’s Prosecutor General’s office.
Gershkovich is accused of “gathering secret information” for the CIA about Uralvagonzavod, a facility in the Sverdlovsk region that produces and repairs military equipment, the Prosecutor General’s office said in a statement, revealing for the first time the details of the accusations against him.
The officials didn’t provide any evidence to back up the accusations.
The Wall Street Journal and its parent company, Dow Jones, called the charge “false and baseless” and repeated their call for Gershkovich to be released.
There was no word on when the trial would begin.
Gershkovich was detained while on a reporting trip to Yekaterinburg in March 2023 and accused of spying for the United States. The reporter, his employer and the U.S. government denied the allegations, and Washington designated him as wrongfully detained.
