Court orders Russian-US journalist to stay in jail another 6 weeks

By The Associated Press

A Russian court has ordered a Russian-American journalist who was detained last week on charges of failing to register as a foreign agent to remain in custody until early December, her employer reported. Alsu Kurmasheva, an editor for the U.S. government-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Tatar-Bashkir service, appeared in a closed session in a court in the city of Kazan, the capital of the Tatarstan republic. The radio service said the court ordered her to be held until Dec. 5, rejecting her lawyer’s request for preventive measures other than incarceration. She is the second U.S. journalist detained in Russia this year, after Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was arrested on espionage charges in March. Gershkovich remains in custody.