US journalist's closed trial for espionage set to begin in Russia, with a conviction all but certain

Fifteen months after Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was arrested in the Russian city of Yekaterinburg on espionage charges, he returns to that city for a trial behind closed doors. The 32-year-old Gershkovich, the American-born son of immigrants from the Soviet Union, is the first Western journalist to be arrested on espionage in post-Soviet Russia. Both his employer and the U.S. government vigorously deny the allegations. The State Department has declared him “wrongfully detained,” thereby committing the government to assertively seek his release. The newspaper has worked vigorously to keep the case in the public eye, and it has become an issue in the combative months leading up to the U.S. presidential election.