MOSCOW, May 9. /TASS/. Russian authorities are considering US applications for a consular visit to Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, arrested in Russia on espionage charges, in accordance with the law, but Moscow sees only Washington's attempts to put pressure on the situation, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said on Tuesday.
"Dialogue means searching for solutions. We see only pressure attempts and threats from the American side. First of all, this is not how dialog is conducted. Second - regardless of the US attempts to exert pressure, all requests for a consular visit to Evan Gershkovich are considered by our relevant services, structures in a calm working manner," he said.
Gershkovich case
According to the Center for Public Relations of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB), Gershkovich, "acting as an agent for the American side, collected top-secret data about the activity of an enterprise of the Russian military-industrial complex." In this connection, the journalist was detained in Yekaterinburg at the end of March; criminal proceedings were initiated against him under Article 276 of the Russian Criminal Code (Espionage). According to Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov, Gershkovich was caught red-handed. The Lefortovo court in Moscow has sanctioned his arrest until May 29.
On April 27, the Russian Foreign Ministry said that the US request for consular visit to Gershkovich on May 11 was denied. A senior diplomat of the US embassy in Moscow was summoned to the Foreign Ministry that day and presented with a note of protest over the disruption of provision of visas to Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s reporter pool during his recent visit to the UN headquarters in New York.
"It was particularly emphasized that an act of sabotage [failure to issue visas to a group of journalists who were to accompany Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on a trip to New York as members of an official delegation] aimed at hindering normal journalistic work will not remain without retaliation. In this connection, the US embassy has been informed that its request for a consular visit on May 11 this year to US citizen Gershkovich, detained on charges of spying, has been rejected," the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.