For some 25 years, Alsu Kurmasheva worked as a journalist at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Tatar-Bashkir Service. Then, six months ago, as she says, "in an instant, it turned into a crime."
That instant came exactly on October 18 when Kurmasheva, a Russian-U.S. dual citizen, was arrested in Kazan and charged with failing to register as a "foreign agent" under a punitive Russian law that targets journalists, civil society activists, and others.
Later, she was charged with spreading falsehoods about the Russian military and faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted.
RFE/RL and the U.S. government say the charges are a reprisal for her work as a journalist for RFE/RL. She had traveled to Russia to visit and care for her elderly mother and was initially detained while waiting for her return flight on June 2 at Kazan airport, where her passports were confiscated.
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U.S. Journalist Detained In Russia Defiantly Insists She Will Walk Free
"On October 18 last year, I was imprisoned on charges that still don’t make sense inside my head," she wrote in a recent message published by a Tatar-language monthly in Kazan.
Kurmasheva, who lives in Prague with her husband, Pavel Butorin, who is also a journalist for RFE/RL in Prague, and their two daughters, ages 12 and 15, described her prison conditions as poor and said her health has deteriorated as she has been unable to access treatment.
Alsu writes that "some illnesses have intensified," but medication and regular exercise "give me the strength to hold on and endure the pain."
"She's being held in inhumane conditions for the mere fact of being an American," Butorin said. "I want the Russian government to explain to me and my children why exactly Alsu is being held hostage. She's not an opposition politician. She's not an activist. She's not a criminal. Her detention is wrongful. She doesn't belong in jail."
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Minimal Health Care, No Room To Move: Jailed RFE/RL Journalist Describes Russian Prison
Many critics and rights groups say the so-called "foreign agent" law is used by the Kremlin to crack down on any dissent.
Moscow has also been accused of detaining Americans to use as bargaining chips to exchange for Russians jailed in the United States.
"Russian authorities are conducting a deplorable criminal campaign against the wrongfully detained Alsu Kurmasheva," according to RFE/RL President Stephen Capus.
Journalism watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) added that as health issues continue to worsen for Kurmasheva "due to the deplorable conditions of the Russian prison system, her rights as a U.S. citizen are constantly denied by the authorities."
"The refusal to grant her access to U.S. consular assistance is a blatant violation of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations (VCCR). RSF urges the U.S. government to step up its efforts to get her released," Jeanne Cavelier, head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk, said in a statement marking the six months Kurmasheva has been detained.
Another U.S. journalist, Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, has been held in detention since March 2023 on spying charges both he and the newspaper vehemently deny, saying the 32-year-old was merely doing his job as an accredited reporter when he was arrested.
In February, 23 countries nominated Kurmasheva for the UNESCO/Guillermo Cano 2024 World Press Freedom Prize.
The prize, created in 1997, is an annual award that honors a person or a group of people who make an "outstanding" contribution to the defense and promotion of press freedom across the globe despite the "danger and persecution" they face.
For Kurmasheva, awards are something she has little time to focus on.
Instead, her goal, she says, is simple: "My greatest wish is to come out of here alive and well."