World

Japanese Journalist Arrested on Sakhalin Island on Espionage Charges

By Al Jazeera Staff

The Federal Security Service (FSB) announced that a Japanese journalist was arrested on Russia’s far‑eastern Sakhalin Island and later transferred to Moscow. The FSB said the suspect, identified by the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs as Imai Yuki, worked for Japan’s Hokkaido Shimbun newspaper and was accused of gathering information on Russian defence capabilities for Japanese intelligence. The charges carry a potential sentence of up to 20 years in prison.

Imai was arrested in Yuzhno‑Sakhalinsk, the island’s main city, as he was preparing to leave Russia. He was flown to Moscow, where a court ordered his detention pending investigation. A video released by TASS, attributed to the FSB, shows masked officers handcuffing him in a hotel room, transporting him to an interrogation room, and later boarding a plane with two FSB servicemen. He was then presented in a Moscow court, which authorised his custody for nearly two months.

The arrest occurs amid heightened tensions between Russia and Japan following President Vladimir Putin’s August visit to the Kuril Islands, a group of islands claimed by both countries. The Sakhalin region includes Sakhalin Island and the four southernmost islands of the Kuril chain, which Japan calls the Northern Territories. Russia and Japan have not signed a formal World War II peace treaty, largely because of the unresolved territorial dispute.

Russia has arrested several foreigners on espionage charges since its 2022 invasion of Ukraine, including Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, who was convicted in 2023, sentenced to 16 years, and later released in a prisoner swap in August 2024.