An American with Russian roots was arrested for treason when she went to visit relatives in the Russian Federation.

A resident of Los Angeles, who has Russian and US citizenship, was arrested in the Russian Federation on charges of treason. She allegedly raised funds for Ukrainian organizations and openly supported Kyiv, reports CNN.

Photo: iStock.com/da-kuk

Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) said the 33-year-old woman, who formerly lived in Los Angeles, was detained in the Russian city of Yekaterinburg for "providing financial assistance to a foreign state to support activities directed against Russian security."

We are talking about Ksenia Karelina (in the USA her last name is Havana). Human rights activists of the First Department project say that, according to their data, the criminal case is related to the fact that on February 24, 2022, she transferred $51,8 from her American bank account to the Razom for Ukraine fund, reports Kommersant. Karelina came to Yekaterinburg to see her family; the FSB had no questions for her at the border.

From Ksenia Karelina’s social networks it is known that in 2013 she graduated from the Faculty of History of the Ural Federal University (RF) with a degree in socio-cultural services and tourism, and later from the University of Maryland in Baltimore (USA).

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The girl stopped posting on her page on the social network VKontakte at the end of 2021, at the same time she talked about obtaining American citizenship. In the summer of 2023, Karelina married an American.

Americans in Russian prisons

Moscow has detained several US citizens in recent years. Some of them were exchanged for Russian prisoners who were in prisons in Western countries.

In Yekaterinburg last March, the FSB arrested American journalist Evan Gershkovich, a reporter for the Wall Street Journal, accusing him of espionage. Gershkowitz, his employer and the US government categorically deny these allegations.

On February 20, the Moscow City Court rejected the appeal of Gershkovich’s lawyers and upheld his preliminary detention until March 30.

If Gershkovich is found guilty, he faces up to 20 years in prison.

Russian President Vladimir Putin recently suggested that "an agreement could be reached" with the United States to swap Gershkovich for Vadim Krasikov. A Russian man is serving a life sentence in Germany for the murder of a former Chechen militant in Berlin in 2019.

Gershkovich's detention has been extended several times since his arrest in March 2023.

“Listen, I’ll tell you: in one country, a country that is an ally of the United States, there is a man who, out of patriotic motives, eliminated a bandit in one of the European capitals,” Putin said in interview Tucker Carlson.

“We have no taboo on solving this problem. We are ready to solve it, but there are certain conditions that are being discussed through special channels between the intelligence services. I think that an agreement can be reached,” Putin said.

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In December 2022, Russia released WNBA star Brittney Griner as part of a prisoner exchange that included Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout. Griner, who played in the offseason for many years for the Russian women's basketball team, was detained in February of that year on drug smuggling charges at a Moscow region airport.

Former US Marine Paul Whelan was sentenced to 16 years in prison in June 2020 on espionage charges, which he vehemently denies.

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