Evan Gershkovich, a US reporter, is accused of being a CIA spy and has been detained in a Moscow jail for over a year. He could face up to 20 years in prison — unless he’s saved by a last-minute prisoner swap.
Russia’s war in Ukraine had been going on for about a year when Evan Gershkovich arrived in Yekaterinburg, in the foothills of the Ural Mountains, on March 29, 2023. He was there to research a story about the infamous Wagner Group and their recruitment methods — and potentially to find out what Russians think about the mercenary fighting unit.
Yekaterinburg is also the headquarters of Uralvagonzavod, a large Russian defense company that, among other things, makes tanks for use in Ukraine. Could this have been the reason for Gershkovich being there, of all places, some 1,800 kilometers (1,120 miles) east of Moscow? The answer is unclear. What is clear, however, is that visiting the city will seal his fate.
Do you actually think that intelligence agencies are only in contact with one guy? Why wouldn’t the CIA be interested in a reporter traveling to Russia to do a story about Wagner?
Whether the CIA is interested in the guy is one thing, they’re probably interested in a lot of things. The guy working for them is another.
Spies being interested in you, and being a spy, are not the same thing.
Yeah I agree, it’s impossible to know if he’s a spy or not. He might even not know he had shared intresset with other agencies, someone might have led him closer to Wagner than he initially intended.
But he does raise a lot of questions for the Russian it intelligence.
Yeah, I think it’s pretty easy to say he’s not a spy. If he was, he’s the dumbest spy in the history of spies.
The whole issue is your “if”, basically you don’t know, and you are just guessing. Out of curiosity how do define a spy?
Well, yeah, of course I cannot be certain. I am not that guy. That’s why I’m just trying to apply some basic sense. A spy to me is a person doing espionage work specifically for their government. The difference with a journalist is a journalist is not working specifically for their government, and will publicly publish their findings where a spy would usually not.
I think we have a different view of spying, this can also be Russians just want a prisoner swap.
All intelligence services have people working for them undercover, you can be hired by or talked into doing x and y by an some intelligence service, you can also be asked to share information with them. They can even help you getting in contact with the right people to make what ever you’re trying to do easier.
You can say that a journalist will publish it findings, but also the journalist can do a lot of other things. I mean I can think of multiple things that the CIA would be interested in that is not necessarily related to the journalistic job. Like recruiting a spy inside Wagner, milking information that is a secret: locations, personnel or arsenal. It can also be a damageing story, Russias official stance is that Wagner is not controlled by the state.
Is he a spy? Does he become a spy if he is spying?
Anyways we don’t know, Russia maybe just wants s prisoner swap, and maybe this journalist was digging in places that he shouldn’t have. We arrest Russian and Chinese spies all the time, some of them are working as journalists.
Certainly, a journalist could be an asset or informant or whatever you’d want to call it, for an intelligence service. He’s putting himself and his professional reputation at risk though. If the intelligence service wanted x piece of information about whatever, there are simply easier ways to get it. Bribe a Russian.
You don’t need to ask the American guy that everyone already knows about and is probably being watched to go look at it for you.
I also haven’t heard of any journalists being arrested for espionage in the west.
This is one of the more recent
https://www.euronews.com/2024/04/08/shrouded-in-secrecy-sweden-expels-chinese-journalist