A court in Tatarstan approved the arrest of Radio Liberty editor Alsu Kurmasheva in the case of “foreign agents”

The Supreme Court of Tatarstan approved the decision to arrest the editor of Idel. Realities »Alsu Kurmasheva. Mediazona was informed about this by the press service of the court.

The journalist is accused of failing to provide documents for inclusion in the register of “foreign agents” (Part 3 of Article 330.1 of the Criminal Code), her detained October 18. Two days later, the investigation asked to place her in custody, but the court initially refused, extending the period of detention for three days. On October 23, the Sovetsky District Court of Kazan sent Kurmasheva to a pre-trial detention center.

The case of the editor of Idel.Realii is the first known case of application of Part 3 of Article 330.1 of the Criminal Code, which establishes punishment for refusal to register as a “foreign agent” by a person “carrying out targeted collection of information in the field of military, military-technical activities of the Russian Federation (*aggressor country), which if received by foreign sources, they can be used against the security of the Russian Federation (*aggressor country).”

According to Tatar-Inform, the investigation believes that Kurmasheva “deliberately conducted a targeted collection of military information about Russian activities via the Internet in order to transmit information to foreign sources” – in particular, security officials believe, she received information about the mobilized teachers of one of the universities in Tatarstan.

Shortly after Kurmasheva’s arrest, Radio Liberty reported that the journalist had previously lived in Prague; in May, “due to urgent family needs,” she returned to Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism). When she tried to go back to the Czech Republic in June, she was detained at the airport and both passports were taken away: American and Russian. On October 11, the magistrate fined Kurmasheva 10 thousand rubles in the case of failure to notify of second citizenship (Article 330.2 of the Criminal Code).