The Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced on Friday that it and 22 other countries have nominated Radio Free Europe (RSE) journalist Alsa Kurmaševa, who has been detained by security officials in Russia for more than 120 days, for the UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Freedom Prize. media in 2024.
The annual award, which was established in 1997, honors a person or group of people for an "outstanding" contribution to the defense and promotion of media freedom in the world despite the "danger and persecution" they face.
Kurmasheva, a Prague journalist for Radio Free Europe who holds American and Russian citizenship, has been in Russian custody since October 18 on charges of violating the so-called "foreign agents" law.
Despite spending about four months in detention, the US State Department has yet to declare her unjustly detained as it has done with other US citizens detained in Russia.
Her designation would raise the profile of the case against Kurmaševa, effectively branding it politically motivated.
Two other US citizens held by Russia - Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and former US Marine Paul Whelan - have been labeled as wrongfully detained.
Kurmasheva, who has been reporting for Radio Free Europe's Tatar-Bashkir service for almost 25 years, left the Czech capital in mid-July due to family commitments in her native Tatarstan, one of Russia's many republics.
She was briefly detained while waiting for her return flight on June 2 last year at the Kazan airport, where both her passports and phone were confiscated.
After five months of waiting for a decision in her case, Kurmasheva was fined 10.000 rubles ($109) for failing to register her American passport with Russian authorities.
Unable to leave Russia without travel documents, Kurmasheva was arrested again last October and this time accused of failing to register as a "foreign agent". Two months later, she was accused of spreading lies about the Russian military.
Kurmasheva recently wrote from her prison cell in the Russian city of Kazan that her detention "is slowly but surely becoming less and less bearable."
Many critics and human rights groups say the Kremlin is using the so-called "foreign agents" law to crack down on any form of dissent.
Moscow has been accused of detaining the Americans to use them as leverage to negotiate an exchange for Russians imprisoned in the United States.
Kurmasheva is one of four Radio Free Europe journalists – Andrej Kuzniečik, Ihar Losik and Vladislav Yesipenko are the other three – who are currently in prison on charges related to their work.
Human rights groups and Radio Free Europe have repeatedly called for the release of the four, saying they were illegally detained.
Losik is a blogger and contributor to the Belarusian service of Radio Free Europe who was convicted in December 2021 on several charges, including "organizing and preparing actions that grossly violate public order" and sentenced to 15 years in prison.
Kuznechik, editor of the website of the Belarusian service of Radio Free Europe, was sentenced in June 2022 to six years in prison after a trial that lasted no more than a few hours. He was convicted of "creating or participating in an extremist organization."
Jesipenka, who has dual citizenship of Ukraine and Russia and who worked as an associate for Crimean Realities, the regional desk of Radio Free Europe's Ukrainian service, was sentenced to six years in prison in February 2022 by a Russian judge in occupied Crimea after a trial behind closed doors. He was convicted of "possession and transport of explosives". Jespenko firmly rejected that accusation.
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