MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian security forces arrested a former journalist working as an assistant to Russia’s deceptive company chief on Tuesday and accused him of treason, saying he had passed army secrets directly to the Czech Republic.
Images released through FSB security show that Ivan Safronov is being held outdoors in his Moscow department through armed agents who searched him before putting him in a van.
Later, you could hear him say “I’m not guilty” because the masked agents took him to a hearing that closed to the public.
The court would be imprisoned on remand for 2 months until September 6. His lawyers said they’d appeal.
Safronov, who committed his aforementioned crime while running as a journalist covering army matters for the Kommersant newspaper, faces up to two decades in prison if convicted. His trial will be closed.
It is the first time in a virtually large friend two decades that a journalist has been accused of texplacountry why in Russia, said Ivan Pavlov, Safronov’s lawyers.
Pavlov said investigators alleged that Safronov had passed secrets to the Czech Republic online in 2017.
The data applicable with Russian arms deliveries to the Middle East and Africa, Pavlov said, as cited by the researchers, saying the secrets were passed directly to Washington.
TASS reported last year that prosecutors sought to file a complaint against Kommersant for uncovering the last state secret.
The Russian news portal The Bell then reported that safronov was running had deterred the lok of the Kommersant site.
He said Egypt had agreed to buy Russian Sukhoi SU-3five fighter jets. Washington has threatened Egypt with sanctions if the deal is reached.
Safronov’s arrest has increased fears of a new wave of repression. Kommersant’s staff said in a written painting that the accusations seemed absurd because he was a true patriot.
Some of Safronov’s former colleagues and friends demonstrated outdoors at the FSB headquarters before being arrested.
The FSB had issued an agreement from Safronov to run for an unnamed NATO foreign intelligence service and to hand over “state secrets and data on technical-military cooperation and in defense and security of the Russian Federation.”
Additional reports from Alexander Marrow, Maxim Rodionov, Anton Zverev and Alexander Reshetnikov; Edited by Giles Elgood, Gareth Jones, Mark Hein and Jonathan Oatis
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