Events by Alsu Kurmasheva

Alsu Kurmasheva is a journalist with RFE/RL’s Tatar-Bashkir Service who was detained in Kazan, Russia, on October 18, 2023. Alsu holds U.S. and Russian citizenship and lives in Prague, Czech Republic, with her husband and two daughters. Alsu traveled to Russia on May 20, 2023, to care for her elderly, ailing mother. She was temporarily detained while waiting for her return flight on June 2, 2023. Authorities at Kazan airport confiscated her U.S. and Russian passports, preventing her from leaving the country. She was subsequently fined 10,000 rubles ($103) for failure to register her U.S. passport with Russian authorities. Before she could pay this fine, she was detained again on October 18, 2023, for failing to declare herself a “foreign agent.” On December 11, 2023, Russian authorities launched a third investigation against Alsu for “spreading false information” about Russia’s military. Following a rapid and secret trial, Kurmasheva was convicted of “spreading false information” about Russia’s military on July 19, 2024, and sentenced to six and a half years in prison.



Alsu’s detention was condemned by the governments of Austria, Canada, Czech Republic, France, Poland, and Sweden, two dozen U.S. lawmakers, as well as by EU, OSCE, US and UN officials. President Biden called for Alsu’s immediate release at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on April 27, 2024. Human rights and press freedom organizations condemned Alsu’s politically-motivated detention and called for her immediate release, including  Amnesty International, the Committee to Protect Journalists, Freedom House, Memorial, PEN America, Reporters Without Borders, the International Federation of Journalists, and the International Press Institute.



After more than nine months in prison, Alsu was released as part of a prisoner exchange between the United States and Russia on August 1, 2024.