13 Oct 2026
Rare Call Between Blinken, Lavrov Over Arrest of American Journalist In Russia
Washington D.C./03.04.23/Turan: U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Sunday held a rare call with Russia's Sergei Lavrov to press for the immediate release of an American journalist, TURAN's Washington correspondent reports.
Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, a U.S. citizen assigned to the newspaper’s Moscow bureau, was arrested last week in Yekaterinburg on espionage charges.
Blinken has expressed his grave concern to Lavrov over the detention of the journalist, the State Department said in a readly of the call.
Separately, Blinken “urged the Kremlin to immediately release wrongfully detained U.S. citizen Paul Whelan,” who was arrested in Moscow in 2018 and convicted of espionage in 2020.
“The Secretary and Foreign Minister Lavrov also discussed the importance of creating an environment that permits diplomatic missions to carry out their work,” according to the readout.
Alex Raufoglu
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