Opinion by Jason Rezaian: The American journalist arrested by Russia is a hostage, not an “alleged spy”
demonstrates, Putin considers hostage-taking a key part of his foreign policy arsenal.
As news broke of Gershkovich’s arrest, however, most of the news coverage conveyed a different message. Almost unanimously, it suggested that Gershkovich was accused of espionage, and usually did so in the headline. This is, at best, doing the dirty work of perpetuating an unproven narrative of a bad-faith state actor.
Their argument usually goes as follows: “While we agree that in all likelihood the charges are false and this fellow citizen is being held as leverage because he is an American, we don’t know that for sure. What we do know is that the authorities said they have arrested him because of allegations of a crime.”While those justifications are understandable, it does not mean foregrounding the charges is the right way to approach these stories.
Many good and intelligent people in the West instinctively believe that when an individual is accused of a crime, there is at least some probable cause. That instinct is a fundamental reason for why the presumption of innocence is a core principle of our criminal justice system. It’s also why suspending these principles is authoritarians’ preferred way to silence critics.Our first instinct must be to defend all journalists’ rights to do their work.
If you take anything away from the massive volume of Evan Gershkovich coverage coming your way in the coming days, let it be this: He is a hostage until proven otherwise.
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