Russia’s Prosecutor General’s Office requested the extradition of former Russian state television anchor Farida Kurbangaleeva from the Czech Republic, the journalist wrote on social media late Monday.
Kurbangaleeva, a former presenter of the Vesti news program on the state-run channel Rossiya 1, left the network in 2014 after Russia’s annexation of Crimea.
The extradition request, a photo of which Kurbangaleeva posted on Facebook, does not specify the charges against her, but the journalist said she believes it is linked to criminal charges pressed against her last summer — one for “justifying terrorism” and another for spreading “false information” about the Russian military.
Kurbangaleeva dismissed the charges as fabricated and said she was not concerned that the Czech Republic would comply with the request.
Kurbangaleeva worked for the Prague-based Russian-language television network Current Time, a project of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), between 2018 and 2021. She now works with the exiled news outlet Govorit NeMoskva and runs her own YouTube channel.
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