Another American journalist detained in Russia

Alsu Kurmasheva, an American journalist, was arrested after visiting her family in the Russian city of Kazan. Now, she is being accused of a crime, according to her coworkers.

She worked as an editor for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in Prague, which is funded by the United States. On 2 June, she was held for a short time by authorities.

She was arrested again on Wednesday and accused of not registering as a foreign agent. If convicted, she may be sentenced to up to five years in jail.

Ms Kurmasheva is the second American journalist who has been detained in Russia this year.

Evan Gershkovich, a reporter for Wall Street Journal in Moscow, who is 31 years old, was arrested in March for spying. This month, a court in Moscow said no to his request and told him that he needs to stay in jail.

His boss and the United States government are saying that the accusations are not true and that he is being kept so he can be exchanged for Russians who are held in the custody of the United States or its friends.

Alsu Kurmasheva has citizenship in both the US and Russia. She works for RFE/RL’s Tatar-Bashkir service. Tatar and Bashkir are two similar languages spoken by native people in two parts of Russia.

According to RFE/RL, Ms. Kurmasheva, who lives in Czech Republic, went to Kazan at the end of May because of a family emergency. She was stopped and held by authorities while waiting for her flight back home and they took away her passports from Russia and America.

She was accused of not registering as a foreign agent and of gathering information for foreign governments, as reported by a local state news website called Tatar Inform.

Dmitry Kolezev, a well-known journalist from Russia, explained that the law Ms Kurmasheva was accused of breaking was written in a way that makes it possible to restrict gathering simple information about military members, like their names and which unit they belong to. “They captured another person,” he added.

Ms Kurmasheva’s work often dealt with problems that people from different ethnic backgrounds in central Russia experience.

According to independent Russian media organizations and press freedom watchdogs, Russian authorities often use strict laws to bother journalists and prevent them from reporting freely on important matters.

Many reporters and people who oppose the Kremlin have been called “foreign agents”. This includes Dmitry Muratov, who won the Nobel Peace Prize.

Last year in September, Ivan Safronov, a journalist for Kommersant and Vedomosti, was given a 22-year prison sentence for the crime of treason.

In March, a student named Dmitry Ivanov was given a prison sentence of eight and a half years for sharing false information about the Russian army on the messaging app called Telegram.