Russia sentences Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich to 16 years in sham trial

(NEW YORK POST) – Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was convicted Friday of espionage and sentenced to 16 years on charges that his employer and the U.S. have rejected as fabricated. The conclusion of his swift and secretive trial in the country’s highly politicized legal system perhaps cleared the way for a prisoner swap between Moscow and Washington. When the judge in the Sverdlovsk Regional Court asked Gershkovich if he understood the verdict, he said yes.

He was the first US journalist taken into custody on espionage charges since Nicholas Daniloff in 1986, at the height of the Cold War. Gershkovich’s arrest shocked foreign journalists in Russia, even though the country has enacted increasingly repressive laws on freedom of speech after sending troops into Ukraine.

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Closing arguments took place behind closed doors at the trial, where Gershkovich did not admit any guilt, according to the court’s press service.

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