Russia detains a correspondent of the newspaper 'The Wall Street Journal' for alleged espionage

US correspondent Evan Gershkovich risks being sentenced by Russia to a maximum of 20 years in prison.

The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), heir to the KGB, arrested The

in the city of Yekaterinburg, in the Ural region, where the country is divided between Europe and Asia.

The Russian authorities accuse him of having committed an alleged crime of espionage by collecting information about a company in the military industry during the war.

Various independent and official Russian media indicate that he was preparing a report on the popularity of the Wagner mercenary company among the population.

"Gershkovich, following the instructions of the American side, collected information that constitutes a state secret about the activities of one of the companies of the Russian military-industrial complex," the FSB said in a statement accusing the reporter of spying "in the interest of the United States Government”.

has shown for its part "its deepest concern for the safety" of the journalist and has flatly denied the Russian accusations.

In a statement sent to Reuters,

"vehemently denies the FSB's accusations and calls for the immediate release" of the reporter.

Despite these appeals, and without waiting for the judicial conclusions, the Kremlin seems to already be clear about its guilt.

"As far as we know, he was caught

," said the Russian president's spokesman, Dmitri Peskov.

For her part, the representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, María Zajárova, reinforced that statement.

“It is not the first time that, with the condition of 'foreign correspondent', both the journalist visa and the accreditation are used by foreigners to cover up activities in our country that are not journalistic.

He is not the first Westerner to be discovered in these circumstances, ”said the diplomat.

The independent newspaper

banned in Russia under the label of an undesirable organization, has reported that Gershkovich was arrested this Wednesday in front of a restaurant in the city of the Urals.

The outlet pointed out that the American reporter was in this city collecting information on the attitude of the Russian population towards the Wagner private army, the protagonist both for its bloody offensive in the Bakhmut area, in eastern Ukraine, and for the open confrontation between its owner, Yevgueni Prigozhin, and the leadership of the Ministry of Defense.

The newspaper also notes that Gershkovich would have visited the city of Nizhny Tagil, where a Uralvagonzavod tank factory is located.

The vice president of the Security Council and former Russian president, Dmitri Medvedev, toured its facilities in October last year.

's information

about Wagner's report is confirmed by the newspaper

one of the main media in the country.

The newspaper stresses that the journalist previously met with a public relations specialist, Yaroslav Shirshikov, "to study society's attitude towards Wagner."

Gershkovich, born in 1991, has lived in Russia for six years and is a member of

's Moscow bureau.

The Russian security forces themselves emphasize in their information that the journalist is legally accredited in the country by the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

In addition to writing for that American medium, the journalist also collaborated with the France Presse agency and the independent Russian newspaper

The correspondent had been missing since Wednesday.

The

newspaper reports that his phone was last online at 1:28 p.m. Moscow time.

According to the local newspaper

, a reader witnessed the arrest of a man in the center of the city.

"When they took the detainee away, they covered his head with a T-shirt so that passers-by could not see his face," the outlet added.

Gershkovich's detention coincides with the worst moment in US-Russian relations in decades, a situation in which one of the few elements of contact between Washington and Moscow centers on the exchange of their prisoners.

In December, American basketball player Brittney Griner was handed over by Moscow in exchange for arms dealer Víktor Bout, known as

The athlete had been sentenced to nine years in prison, of which she spent 10 months behind bars.

Arrested the father of the girl in the drawing

The Belarusian security forces have also arrested Alexei Moskaliov in the last few hours, sentenced to two years in prison for discrediting the Russian army, lawyer Dmitri Zajvatov informed the Russian media Dozhd.

The lawyer pointed out that the capture operation would have been coordinated "at the highest level" between Aleksandr Lukashenko's KGB and Vladimir Putin's FSB.

The Minsk apartment where he was hiding was vandalized during his search.

Moskaliov, 53, had fled from his house arrest in the early morning of the day he was to hear his verdict.

The man came to the attention of Russian police last year after his daughter, Maria Moskaliova,

, then 12, made an anti-war drawing at school showing Russia firing missiles at a mother and child. ukrainians.

Following a months-long investigation, Moskaliov was formally charged with discrediting the Russian Armed Forces in connection with separate anti-war comments he allegedly made on social media.

On March 1, the same day her father was arrested, the girl was sent to an orphanage.

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