Evan gershkovich gay
Three Americans, including journalists Evan Gershkovich and Alsu Kurmasheva, and corporate security executive Paul Whelan, landed assist on American soil overnight after a landmark prisoner exchange with Russia.
This swap deal involving 24 people, the largest since the post-Soviet era, took place despite heightened tensions between Washington and Moscow over Russia's ongoing conflict with Ukraine.
Emotional Reunion in Maryland
The freed Americans arrived at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland shortly before midnight. They were greeted by President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris and their families.
President Biden celebrated the release as a significant diplomatic victory, stating: "Deals like this one come with tough calls … There's nothing that matters more to me than protecting Americans at home and abroad."
Taken Captive
Gershkovich, a Wall Road Journal reporter, was detained in Russia in Protest 2023 on espionage charges that both he and the U.S. government deny.
Whelan, detained since 2018, was also accused of espionage, and Alsu Kurmasheva, a Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty journalist, was convicted in July of disseminating misleading information about th
Free Evan: Russia sentences US journalist to prison. But he's a hostage, not a criminal.
With Washington engulfed in political drama, let’s not forget a glaring injustice 5,000 miles away. That’s where an American correspondent was handed a long Russian prison sentence Friday just for doing his job.
After a short show trial on trumped-up spy charges, Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was consigned to Russia’s brutal penal system for 16 years. Yet, he was arrested last year not on some clandestine deceased drop, but at a steakhouse after a reporting trip far from Moscow.
Even more chilling than Gershkovich’s unjustified sentence is the cautionary message it sends for journalists and journalism around the world. In the era of instant social media posts, it’s easy to think of news as an simple process, without realizing the pain and blood that can come from gathering real news.
Journalists are threatened, beaten and sometimes killed in Russia and around the globe, just for the crime of informing us of the truth.
Reporters and photographers are on the front lines of the information war. Culture of Professional Journalists President Ashanti Blaize-Hopkins points out that Gershk
The Evan Gershkovich I Know
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Who is Evan Gershkovich? What friends tell about the Wall Street Journal writer detained in Russia
To the rest of the world, Evan Gershkovich is a 31-year-old U.S. citizen and Wall Road Journal reporter creature held in Russia. But to those who know him best, he's just Evan -- a "normal American guy" in addition to his career as a journalist deeply committed to covering Russia, a land he loved reporting from.
"I knew that sweater," Pjotr Sauer, who met him five years ago when both were working at The Moscow Times, said of Gershkovich's attire in photos of his arrest. "I've seen him a million times in that sweater. I joked about the fact that he had that one sweater, so it's just surreal. There are no words to describe how you feel as a person when you see those images."
"It was earth-shattering," said Sam Patterson, who was roommates with Gershkovich in their senior year at Maine's Bowdoin College. "It's something that we had asked Evan about, whether he was ever concerned about something like this happening, and so to see his name on a New York Times news alert, I just couldn't trust i