A United States Journalist, Evan Gershkovich, has been sentenced to 16 years by a Russian penal colony on Friday for “espionage,” a verdict reached after three weeks of secretive hearings condemned by Washington as a sham.
Gershkovich 32, who worked for the Wall Street Journal, pleaded not guilty to the crime.
According to AFP report, the Judge, Justice Andrei Mineyev while announcing the verdict said, Gershkovich was sentenced to “punishment in the form of imprisonment for a term of 16 years in a strict regime colony.”
Meanwhile, the US Government and his employer said the charges against him are false and believe he is being held as a “bargaining chip” to secure the release of Russians convicted abroad.
His trial has moved rapidly since the first hearing in late June, with the prosecution and defence teams giving their final arguments on Friday.
Russia has a policy of not exchanging prisoners internationally unless they have already been convicted, potentially paving the way for Gershkovich to be swapped in a deal.
The Prosecutor, Kremlin has provided no public evidence for the spying allegations against Gershkovich, saying only that he was caught “red-handed” spying on a tank factory in the Urals region and was working for the Central Intelligence Agency.
Kremlin on Friday stated that Gershkovich acted with “careful measures of secrecy.”
