???? Live: FSB security service detains US reporter on spying charges, Russian news agencies say

Issued on: 30/03/2023 – 10:46

10:19am: Wall Street Journal reporter detained in Russia for spying: Russian news agencies

A US reporter for The Wall Street Journal newspaper has been detained in Russia for espionage, Russian news agencies reported Thursday, citing the FSB security service.

“The FSB halted the illegal activities of US citizen Evan Gershkovich … a correspondent of the Moscow bureau of the American newspaper The Wall Street Journal, accredited with the Russian foreign ministry,” the FSB was quoted as saying.

Gershkovich is “suspected of spying in the interests of the American government” and of collecting information “on an enterprise of the Russian military-industrial complex”, agencies reported.

Before joining The Wall Street Journal, the 31-year-old reporter worked for AFP in Moscow. He was previously a reporter for The Moscow Times, an English-language news website.

Gershkovich speaks Russian. His parents live in the United States but are originally from the former Soviet Union.

9:56am: Russia’s upcoming presidency of UN Security Council a ‘bad joke’, Ukraine says

Ukraine on Thursday said Russia’s upcoming presidency of the United Nations Security Council this week was “a bad joke”.

“Russian UN Security Council presidency on April 1 is a bad joke. Russia has usurped its seat; it’s waging a colonial war; its leader is a war criminal wanted by the ICC for kidnapping children. The world can’t be a safe place with Russia at UNSC,” Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba wrote on Twitter.

8:44am: Russian man investigated over daughter’s anti-war drawing has been detained, lawyer says

Alexei Moskalyov, a Russian man who was sentenced to two years in prison for discrediting the Russian armed forces, has been detained after fleeing house arrest, human rights activist and lawyer Dmitry Zakhvatov told Reuters on Thursday.

Moskalyov had vanished from his home on Tuesday night, hours before being sentenced.

He came under police investigation last year over an anti-war picture that his teenage daughter, Masha, drew at school. He was placed under house arrest this month and Masha was taken to a children’s home. 

4:51am: Singaporean PM: Russia’s invasion of Ukraine violated UN charter

Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said on Thursday that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has gravely violated the United Nations charter and international law.

Lee also said that big powers have the responsibility of maintaining stable and workable relations with one another, and the most worrying is the state of relations between the United States and China. He was speaking at the Boao forum in the southern Chinese island province of Hainan. 

Key developments from Wednesday, March 29:

International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Rafael Grossi warned that there was ‘increasing’ military activity around the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine. During his second visit to the plant since Moscow’s invasion last February, Grossi added that the UN nuclear watchdog was working on a plan to ensure Zaporizhzhia’s security.

Ukraine’s ministry of youth and sports suggested that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) was abandoning its principles by recommending Russian and Belarusian athletes take part in international competitions as neutrals amid the war.

King Charles III said that Great Britain and Germany stand united with Ukraine in its battle against Russia’s “unprovoked aggression” at a state banquet in Berlin during his first foreign visit as monarch.

>> Read our live blog for all of yesterday’s developments as they unfolded.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)