Yekaterinburg (Russia) (AFP) - Russia’s speedy espionage trial of US reporter Evan Gershkovich looked set to deliver a verdict on Friday, after just over three weeks of closed-door court proceedings denounced by the White House as a sham.

Prosecutors have requested 18 years in a penal colony for the Wall Street Journal correspondent, the first journalist in Russia to be charged with spying since the Soviet era.

His employer and the White House say the charges are false.

The 32-year-old, who pleaded not guilty to the charges, will be sentenced at 5 pm (1200 GMT), a spokeswoman at Sverdlovsk Regional Court in the city of Yekaterinburg said.

Gershkovich was detained on a reporting trip to the Urals city of Yekaterinburg in March 2023, and has spent almost 16 months in Moscow’s notorious Lefortovo prison.

His trial has moved rapidly since the first hearing in late June, with the prosecution and defence teams giving their final arguments on Friday.

Other similar cases in Russia have dragged on far more slowly with several weeks or even months between hearings.

- Possible prisoner swap -

In Washington’s view, Gershkovich’s arrest was primarily intended to help Russia use him as a “bargaining chip” to secure the release of Russians convicted abroad.

The Kremlin on Friday again refused to comment on his case, or whether the reporter could be exchanged.

“We simply cannot give any other comments, because the trial is ongoing,” spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

Tensions are running extremely high between the countries over Moscow’s military offensive in Ukraine.

Russia has a policy of not exchanging prisoners internationally unless they have already been convicted.

Moscow and Washington have both said they are open to exchanging the reporter in a deal, but neither has given clues on when that might happen.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Wednesday that talks between US and Russian special services over possible prisoner exchanges were ongoing, without naming any specific individuals.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has implied he wants to see the release of Vadim Krasikov, a Russian convicted in Germany of killing a Chechen separatist commander. German judges said it was an assassination orchestrated by Russian authorities.

Among other US nationals detained in Russia are reporter Alsu Kurmasheva and ballerina Ksenia Karelina, who are both dual US-Russian citizens, and former US marine Paul Whelan, who is serving a 16-year sentence for spying.

On Thursday, a Moscow court sentenced former US paratrooper Michael Travis Leake to 13 years in prison on charges of drug dealing.

- ‘Arbitrary’ detention -

The Kremlin has provided no public evidence for the spying allegations against Gershkovich, saying only that he was caught “red-handed” spying on a tank factory in the Urals region and was working for the CIA.

“Evan has never been employed by the United States government. Evan is not a spy,” US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said last month.

A United Nations working group this month stated that Gershkovich’s detention on spying charges was “arbitrary” and called for his immediate release.

The US-born son of Soviet emigres raised in New Jersey, Gershkovich had reported from Russia since 2017, opting to stay on even following Moscow’s Ukraine offensive.

While in prison, he has communicated with friends and family in hand-written letters that revealed he has kept a sense of humour and not lost hope about his situation.

At his first trial hearing on June 26, he spoke briefly to greet journalists and appeared smiling and cheerful, while revealing that his head had been fully shaven.

The Wall Street Journal has called the accusation against Gershkovich bogus, saying he never worked for the US government and was arrested for “simply doing his job”.

The White House has warned US citizens still in Russia to “depart immediately” due to the risk of wrongful arrest.