SAN LUIS POTOSÍ, Mexico.- Ksenia Karelina, a Russian-American dancer living in Los Angeles, was accused of committing treason against Russia for donating just over $50 to a Ukrainian charity in the United States, according to the state news agency TASS.
Karelina, 33, has dual US-Russian citizenship. She was arrested in Ekaterinburg and placed in preventive detention earlier this year when she was in Russia visiting her grandparents.
Authorities in that country accused the dancer of donating $51.80 to a Ukrainian charity during her stay in the United States. She made the donation on the day Russia invaded Ukraine.
According to media reports, prosecutors sentenced her to 12 years in prison, accusing her of raising money for Ukraine to use to purchase tactical military equipment. The organization to which Karelina donated –Reason for Ukraine– is based in New York and is a non-profit group that provides non-military aid to Ukraine.
Karelina’s lawyer, Mikhail Mushailov, said the sentence – which would see her sent to a penal colony – was too harsh for the nature of her offence, and argued that her cooperation in the investigation should provide her with some benefit. She pleaded guilty at a hearing last week.
The announcement comes after the largest prisoner exchange between Russia and the West since the Cold War. Karelina was unable to take part in that exchange because a final verdict in her case had not yet been handed down.
@cbsnews Chris Van Heerden speaks on his girlfriend Ksenia Khavana’s trip to her home country of Russia that ended with her being detained. #news #russia ♬ original sound – cbsnews
Mushailov told reporters Thursday that his legal team would begin working to include her in a future prisoner exchange.
US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby declared this August 15“We will continue to seek consular access to her, of course, and we will continue, as we have been trying, to work for her release.”
Kirby said the verdict represented “vindictive cruelty” on the part of the Russian government. He also said the sentence showed that Russia “does not have a real justice system.”
Karelina lives in Los Angeles and works in a spa and as an amateur dancer. She obtained American citizenship in 2021. Since her arrest, her partner, Chris Van Heerden, has campaigned for her release.
The couple had been on holiday in Istanbul just before their trip. Van Heerden returned to the United States, while Karelina remained in Russia to see her family.
“I thought it might be dangerous for her to go, with everything that is happening with the war in Ukraine, but she reassured me by telling me that she was Russian and that everything would be fine,” she told the BBC in February. media Americans. “So for her birthday in December, I bought her a ticket. I was so excited. Now, I’m hitting myself in the head for it.”
Karelina’s arrest and trial come as Russian President Vladimir Putin’s latest efforts to crack down on dissent within his borders.
In April, Putin signed a decree increasing the sentence to life imprisonment the maximum penalty for treason charges. Previously, the maximum penalty for treason was 20 years.
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